Six honorary degrees to be presented at the 374th Commencement

The University will bestow the honorary degrees during Thursday’s Commencement event in Tercentenary Theatre.

---

Kareem Abdul-Jabbar is recognized globally as one of the finest basketball players to ever grace the court, as well as a dedicated social advocate and celebrated author. During his playing career, he held the NBA’s all-time scoring record for 39 years, accumulating 38,387 points, until his achievement was surpassed in 2023 by fellow Laker icon LeBron James. Abdul-Jabbar has secured six NBA championships and remains the league’s sole six-time MVP. Time magazine honored him as “History’s Greatest Player,” while ESPN and The Pac 12 rated him as the top Collegiate Athlete of the 21st Century.

He has a national platform and regularly writes opinion pieces for various newspapers and magazines worldwide. Currently, he publishes on kareem.substack.com, where he discusses many socially pertinent and politically charged issues our nation faces. As a well-known lecturer, he frequently takes to the speaking circuit.

President Barack Obama presented Abdul-Jabbar with the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation’s highest civilian honor. He has also been granted The Ford Medal of Freedom, The Rosa Parks Award, The Double Helix Medal, and Harvard University’s W.E.B. Du Bois Medal of Courage. Abdul-Jabbar holds eight honorary doctorate degrees and serves as a U.S. Cultural Ambassador, a designation specifically created for him by former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

As a New York Times bestselling author of 17 books, most of which delve into the frequently neglected narratives of African Americans, from the achievements during the Harlem Renaissance to overlooked Black inventors who transformed everyday life, he is a prolific writer. Currently, he has various book and film endeavors in progress.

An acclaimed documentary producer, he has received two Emmy nominations. He featured in HBO’s most-viewed sports documentary of all time, “Kareem: Minority of One,” and worked as a writer/producer on Season 5 of “Veronica Mars.”

In 2015, the Basketball Hall of Fame established the Kareem Abdul-Jabbar College Center of the Year Award, and in 2021, the NBA instituted the Kareem Abdul-Jabbar Social Justice Champion Award.

Due to his commitment to youth education, Abdul-Jabbar serves as the California STEM Ambassador and is also on the Advisory Board for UCLA Health. At 76 years of age, he often quips, “Only my jersey is retired.”

---

Geologist Richard Alley, renowned as one of the foremost professors at Pennsylvania State University, specializes in studying the Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets to forecast future climate and sea level changes. A co-awardee of the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize (with Al Gore), he has received accolades for his research, teaching, and public service, including election to the U.S. National Academy of Sciences and The Royal Society, and has provided counsel to high-ranking government officials from both major political parties. 

After completing his education at Ohio State University and the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where he obtained his Ph.D. in 1987, Alley has written or collaborated on over 400 articles for academic journals detailing the connections between Earth’s cryosphere and global climate change. His research was among the first to indicate that the last Ice Age concluded abruptly and violently, rather than through gradual changes, suggesting a cautionary note to reflect on historical precedents before making environmental decisions for the future.

Alley’s book “The Two-Mile Time Machine,” named a Phi Beta Kappa science book of the year, emphasizes not the long-term shifts that led to the ice ages, but rather the newly uncovered “flickering” climate variations identified by drilling through Greenland’s ice. The ice core revealed rapid, significant climate shifts that have transformed the Earth from habitable to inhospitably frozen to unbearably hot.

Alley has cautioned that the U.N.’s “best estimate” of 3 feet
“““html

the projections of sea-level increase by the conclusion of this century can be deceptive: “It might be 2, it might be 15 or 20,” he indicated.

“Individuals who examine the chronicles of climate urgently require a record,” he expressed to Knowable Magazine in 2022. “I genuinely believe that comprehending the ice ages and the function of carbon dioxide has been a fundamental advancement in grasping the significance of carbon dioxide in our climate.”

Alley was involved with the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and presented the PBS miniseries “Earth: The Operators’ Manual,” which is based on his corresponding publication. In it, he stated, “Science is not merely the outcome of unfeeling machines delivering Truth; it comprises enthusiastic humans chasing truth, fame, and next week’s salary, while simultaneously satisfying their curiosity.”

---

Esther Duflo serves as the Abdul Latif Jameel Professor of Poverty Alleviation and Development Economics within the Department of Economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, co-founding and co-directing the Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL) and Chaire, Pauvreté et politiques publiques at the Collège de France. Her research aims to comprehend the economic realities of the impoverished to aid in shaping and assessing social policies.

Duflo has engaged in areas such as health, education, financial inclusion, the environment, and governance, holding the belief that “Evidence-driven policies are essential for addressing intricate social challenges.”

Renowned for the “Randomista Movement,” which employs randomized control trials to examine poverty interventions, Duflo asserts that without these trials, initiatives aimed at reducing poverty are merely hopeful endeavors. From 2000 to 2012, the quantity of published economic research utilizing randomized control studies nearly saw a fourfold increase.

Duflo has remarked, “To grasp the foundational causes of poverty, one must look beyond the surface,” which she perceives as merely a lack of funds. “To tackle poverty effectively, we must first truly understand the lives of those who are poor.”

Duflo earned her initial degrees in history and economics from École Normale Supérieure in Paris. In 1999, she received her Ph.D. in economics from MIT.

Duflo has garnered a multitude of academic accolades and honors, including the 2019 Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel (shared with co-recipients Abhijit Banerjee and Michael Kremer), the Princess of Asturias Award for Social Sciences in 2015, the A.SK Social Science Award (2015), the Infosys Prize in 2014, the David N. Kershaw Award in 2011, a John Bates Clark Medal in 2010, and a MacArthur “Genius Grant” Fellowship in 2009.

Together with Banerjee, she co-authored “Poor Economics: A Radical Rethinking of the Way to Fight Global Poverty,” which received the Financial Times and Goldman Sachs Business Book of the Year Award in 2011 and has been translated into over 17 languages. She also penned “Good Economics for Hard Times.”

Duflo is affiliated with the National Academy of Sciences and serves as a Corresponding Fellow of the British Academy.

---

Elaine H. Kim is a professor emerita of Asian American and Asian Diaspora Studies in the Department of Ethnic Studies at the University of California, Berkeley, where she also served as chair of the Ethnic Studies Department, associate dean of the Graduate Division, faculty assistant for the Status of Women, and assistant dean in the College of Letters and Science.

The issues of representation and the means of it are pivotal to Kim’s scholarship. At UC Berkeley, she believed, “If something you desire does not exist, you can endeavor to create it,” leading her to help establish the Ethnic Studies Department.

Kim has authored, edited, and co-edited 10 books and directed or produced three documentary films, including “Labor Women” in 2002 and “Slaying the Dragon: Reloaded” in 2011. She has been honored with the Asian Pacific American Heritage Lifetime Achievement Award, the Association for Asian American Studies Lifetime Achievement Award, the State of California Award for Excellence in Education, and the Association for Asian American Studies Cultural Studies Book Award.

Motivated by the representation issues stemming from Hollywood’s stereotypes (“From the outset, there was an interest in representation and a recognition of the significance of films and television on our circumstances. Every student connected with the fact that, for men, there was only Charlie Chan. Bruce Lee was never even an option because of the roles he was denied. For women, the situation was equally dismal — just Madame Butterfly and Dragon Lady,” she articulated to the Cal Alumni Association in 2021), she has endeavored to rectify misconceptions about the Korean community in the U.S. and Asians generally, albeit she expresses her distaste for a singular voice representing an entire community. She has presided over the Association for Asian American Studies and participated on the National Council of the American Studies Association. She also helped establish Asian Women United of California, the Korean Community Center of the East Bay in Oakland, and Asian Immigrant Women Advocates.

Kim previously received an honorary doctorate of laws from Notre Dame University, honorary doctorates in human letters from the University of Massachusetts Boston, Amherst College, the Global Korea Award, and a Fulbright Fellowship.

---

Rita Moreno is a versatile performer celebrated for her remarkable roles such as Anita in “West Side Story,” for which she earned the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress; Louise in “Carnal Knowledge”; Miller in “The Electric Company” (notably popularizing the exclamation “Hey, you guys!”); Sister Peter Marie Reimondo in “Oz”; and most recently, Abuelita Toretto in “Fast X.” She stands among a select group of six women who have achieved the distinction of winning an Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, and Tony.

She commenced…
“““html

She commenced her profession at 9 years old, performing in New York City nightclubs, and debuted in films two years later by dubbing movies in Spanish. Her initial stage performance, alongside Eli Wallach, occurred in 1945, while she was merely 13. She entered films in 1950 with “So Young, So Bad” and continued to work consistently in cinema and television during that period. Her accolades, totaling 43 wins and 51 nominations, include distinctions from the American Latino Media Arts, Critics’ Choice, Golden Globes, BAFTA, and both Daytime and Primetime Emmys, alongside Grammy and NAACP Image awards.

Moreno shattered barriers for Latines and various others. As a social activist, she collaborated with the Civil Rights Movement and participated in the March on Washington in 1963. She has advocated for racial, gender, immigration, education (having attended Public School 132 in Brooklyn but dropped out of high school at 16), and LGBTQ+ rights, and has pushed for aid for Puerto Rico, her birthplace.

Recognizing early typecasting in her career, including having her skin darkened for her part in “West Side Story,” she attributes her enduring success to her ability “to rise up and brush myself off and continue moving ahead.” Moreno stated, “No one is going to dictate how I make my own choices. For far too long, everyone told me what to say, what to do, and how to behave.”

She has received the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the Kennedy Center Honor, the Peabody Award, and the Medal for the National Endowment for the Arts. The 2021 Netflix documentary “Rita Moreno: Just a Girl Who Decided to Go for It” chronicles her remarkable 85-year journey in Hollywood.

---

Abraham Verghese serves as the Linda R. Meier and Joan F. Lane Provostial Professor in the Medicine Department at Stanford University. He also directs PRESENCE, a multidisciplinary center focused on the human experience of patients, doctors, and caregivers.

He initiated his medical education in Ethiopia in 1974, but after a military regime ousted Emperor Haile Selassie, he emigrated to America and spent a year working as a hospital orderly. He has noted that this experience fueled his determination to complete his medical studies. He obtained his bachelor’s degree in medicine in India, followed by a residency in Johnson City, Tennessee, and a fellowship at the Boston University School of Medicine.

In 1985, Verghese returned to Johnson City and was swiftly confronted by the rural AIDS crisis. To narrate this story, he attended the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, writing in 2009, “I discovered my purpose, and it was to become a physician. My goal wasn’t to save the world but rather to heal myself. Few doctors will confess this, especially younger ones, but subconsciously, by entering the profession, we must believe that caring for others will mend our own wounds. And it does. Yet, it can also exacerbate the wound.”

Since 1991, Verghese has contributed to The New Yorker, Granta, The Atlantic, The New York Times, and various other publications. His debut book, “My Own Country,” was adapted into a film directed by Mira Nair; and his novel, “Cutting for Stone,” spent 107 weeks on The New York Times bestseller list. “The Covenant of Water,” his latest release, became a New York Times bestseller, an Oprah choice, and is currently being transformed into a series by Netflix and Harpo Productions.

Verghese is a member of the Institute of Medicine of the National Academies and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. In 2015, President Obama honored him with the National Humanities Medal, “For reminding us that the patient is the center of the medical enterprise. His breadth of expertise encompasses the diversity of the humanities; from his endeavors to promote empathy in healthcare, to his imaginative portrayals of the human narrative.” In 2023, he received a Guggenheim Fellowship. This marks his seventh honorary doctorate.