Boston College Commencement
Carnegie Corporation of New York President Dame Louise Richardson, an accomplished higher education leader who heads one of the country’s oldest and most prestigious philanthropic foundations, will address the Boston College Class of 2025 at the University’s 149th Commencement Exercises on May 19.
University President William P. Leahy, S.J., will present Richardson with an honorary degree at the ceremony, which will take place at 10 a.m. in Alumni Stadium, rain or shine.
In addition, the University will present honorary degrees to: educator and social activist Geoffrey Canada; Salim Daccache, S.J., rector of Saint Joseph University of Beirut, Lebanon; historian and author Doris Kearns Goodwin; and Archbishop of Boston Richard Henning.
More on the 2025 honorary degree recipients:
Dame Louise Richardson
A native of Ireland who served for seven years as the first female vice chancellor at Oxford University, Richardson became the first female president of Carnegie Corporation of New York in January 2023, assuming leadership of a foundation—founded by industrialist Andrew Carnegie in 1911—renowned for establishing and endowing initiatives such as the United States National Research Council, National Bureau of Economic Research, and Children’s Television Workshop (now Sesame Workshop). Among the organizations awarded grants by Carnegie during her tenure are Press Forward, which supports local news initiatives, and New York City Public Libraries, in part to expand English language classes popular with immigrants.
In addition, Richardson—the first in her family to attend college—has cultivated a highly productive, groundbreaking career in academia. For more than three decades, she has researched and written about international terrorism and foreign policy, advocating interdisciplinary approaches to study the political roots of extremism as an alternative to military-led responses. At Oxford, she was lauded for defending freedom of speech, pursuing sustainability, and advancing racial equality. As the first woman principal and vice-chancellor of Scotland’s University of St. Andrews, she recruited students from disadvantaged backgrounds while leading efforts to add a new library, music center, and a medical school, and acquire land for a new campus.
Geoffrey Canada
An education innovator, activist, and author, Geoffrey Canada has pursued a mission of helping youth from under-resourced communities succeed through learning. Canada founded and serves as board president of the Harlem Children’s Zone, a holistic network of programs focused on increasing the high school and college graduation rates among the many at-risk students in the upper Manhattan neighborhood. Under his leadership, the HCZ became a national model. President Obama created the Promise Neighborhoods Initiative to replicate the HCZ prototype in 20 disadvantaged communities.
Born in a South Bronx neighborhood marked by poverty, crime, and violence, Canada was raised by his education-driven mother, who sent him to live with her parents on Long Island for high school. He earned a bachelor’s degree in psychology and sociology from Bowdoin College and a master’s degree from the Harvard Graduate School of Education. In 2020, six years after stepping down as HCZ’s CEO, Canada launched the William Julius Wilson Institute, a national resource that opens pathways to social and economic mobility; its first initiative was a national COVID-19 relief and recovery effort. Canada was named one of the world’s most influential people by Time and among the 50 greatest leaders by Fortune. His books Fist Stick Knife Gun and Reaching Up for Manhood were critically acclaimed.
Salim G. Daccache, S.J.
Salim G. Daccache, S.J., has been rector (president) of Saint Joseph University of Beirut in Lebanon since 2012. Founded in 1875, Saint Joseph University (USJ) is the only Jesuit university in the Arab world, with an enrollment of 12,000 students representing all backgrounds and both Christian and Muslim faith traditions.
A native of Lebanon who is fluent in Arabic, English, French, and Italian, Fr. Daccache is dedicated to enhancing interreligious understanding and serves as director of the Lebanese Association of Friendship and Islamic-Christian Dialogue. He has been praised for his leadership of USJ in the face of instability caused by ongoing regional conflict, the country’s financial crisis, and the aftermath of a deadly port explosion that damaged USJ’s five campuses in Beirut. In 2022, he was presented with the St. Peter Canisius Medal by the International Association of Jesuit Universities for his extraordinary service to Jesuit higher education.
Prior to joining USJ, Fr. Daccache was the rector of Collège Notre-Dame de Jamhour, a Jesuit high school in Lebanon. He earned a bachelor’s degree in philosophy from USJ, a master’s degree in theology and philosophy from the Sèvres Institute in Paris, and doctorates in literature and philosophy from Panthéon-Sorbonne University and educational sciences from the University of Strasbourg in France.
Doris Kearns Goodwin
World-renowned presidential historian and Pulitzer Prize-winning author Doris Kearns Goodwin has penned New York Times best-sellers on numerous United States presidents. Her insightful works provide perspective on and analysis of our country’s leaders, including Abraham Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt, Franklin Roosevelt, and Lyndon Johnson. A sought-after public speaker and media commentator, she often shares historical context on current events.
Goodwin’s No Ordinary Time: Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt: The Home Front in World War II won the Pulitzer Prize for History in 1995. A partner in Pastimes Productions, she produced the documentary miniseries “Washington,” followed by miniseries on Lincoln and the Roosevelts. Her numerous awards include the inaugural American History Book Prize from the New-York Historical Society, and the Gold Medal for biography from the American Academy of Arts and Letters.
She most recently received the Washington Irving Medal for Literary Excellence from the Saint Nicholas Society of the City of New York for her eighth book, An Unfinished Love Story: A Personal History of the 1960s. Her sources for the 2024 volume, being developed by Pastimes and others as a feature film, were the letters, diaries, and other materials amassed by her husband Richard Goodwin, an American writer and presidential advisor who died in 2018.
A graduate of Colby College, she earned a Doctor of Philosophy degree in government from Harvard University.
Archbishop Richard G. Henning, S.T.D.
Last August, Pope Francis announced that Richard G. Henning, S.T.D. would be the 10th bishop and seventh archbishop of the Archdiocese of Boston. His installation followed in October, putting Archbishop Henning at the helm of an archdiocese that serves approximately 1.8 million Catholics through nearly 300 parishes.
Archbishop Henning has been active in the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, serving on the Doctrine Committee, the Subcommittee for the Church in Latin America, and as the Chair of the Subcommittee for the Translation of the Sacred Scriptures. He is also noted for his work with international priests serving in the U.S.
Prior to coming to Boston, Archbishop Henning served as the Bishop of Providence and as an auxiliary bishop in the Diocese of Rockville Centre, NY, his hometown. He received his training for the priesthood at the Seminary of the Immaculate Conception in Huntington, NY, and was ordained in 1992. He holds a doctorate from the University of St. Thomas Aquinas in Rome. While a faculty member of the Seminary of the Immaculate Conception, Archbishop Henning led the Sacred Heart Institute for the ongoing formation of Catholic priests and deacons.