Tom Ridge to Give Law School Commencement Address

Former Pennsylvania Governor Tom Ridge will be the keynote speaker at the Duquesne University School of Law Commencement ceremony during which nearly 125 students will receive their diplomas.

The ceremony, which is slated for Sunday, June 5, at 11 a.m. in the A.J. Palumbo Center, will be preceded by a Mass at 9 a.m. in the University Chapel. Provost Dr. Timothy Austin will confer the degrees at Commencement.

Ridge is the chairman of Ridge Global, which provides solutions to cyber security, international security and risk management issues. He was twice elected and served as governor of Pennsylvania from 1995 to 2001, during which his technology strategy helped drive the state’s growth in economic development, education, health care and the environment. He then served as the first assistant to the president for homeland security until 2003, when he was named the first secretary of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.

A Harvard and Dickinson Law School graduate, Ridge is a member of the board of the Institute for Defense Analysis and the Center for the Study of the Presidency and Congress. He also chairs the U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s National Security Task Force. Ridge served six terms in the U.S. House of Representatives.

The School of Law Commencement ceremony will be available via live stream at http://law.duq.edu/events/commencement-ceremony-2016