The 63rd annual Commencement ceremonies for Claremont McKenna College will be held at 2 p.m. on Saturday, May 15, on Pritzlaff Field on the CMC campus. The keynote speaker for this year will be Henry Kravis '67, founding partner of Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co. and CMC Trustee.
Official Commencement activities begin on Thursday, May 13. A complete schedule of events and travel information can be found at www.cmc.edu/commencement.
About the Commencement Speaker
Henry Kravis began his career as vice president of Katy Industries, a New York Stock Exchange company. He then joined Bear Stearns & Co, became a partner and remained there until 1976, when he and two partners founded Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co. (KKR), a firm that pioneered the development of private equity. Kravis has been involved in the largest and most successful acquisitions via private equity, including RJR Nabisco, Beatrice, Safeway, Duracell, Owens-Illinois, Autozone, TXU, First Data, Toys R Us and Dollar General, among others. In total, his firm has completed over 170 transactions with a total acquisition price of approximately $425 billion. KKR has 14 offices in the United States, Europe, Asia, and Australia.
Kravis has served or is serving on numerous corporate boards of directors, including RJR Nabisco, Safeway, Gillette, Borden, Owens-Illinois and First Data Corporation. He is a board member of the Council on Foreign Relations. He founded and is co-chairman of the New York City Investment Fund, which was designed to create jobs and help small businesses in New York City. He is also on the board and was co-chairman of the Partnership for New York City, which represents the business community in its dealings with the public sector.
Kravis also serves on the Board of Trustees of Mount Sinai Hospital; Public Television Channel 13/WNET New York, for which he served as chairman of the board; Columbia Graduate School of Business, where he serves as co-chairman of the Board; Rockefeller University, where he serves as vice chairman; and CMC, where he founded the Kravis Leadership Institute and has served as its chairman. In 2006, he and his wife, Marie-Josee, established the Henry R. Kravis Prize in Leadership at CMC, which is awarded annually to an individual or organization that demonstrates leadership, creativity, and sustainability in the nonprofit sector. In 2008, the College received a landmark gift of $75 million from The Marie-Jos?e and Henry R. Kravis Foundation for the construction of CMC's new signature building, The Kravis Center.
Kravis earned a B.A. in economics from Claremont McKenna College, and a MBA from the Columbia University Graduate School of Business, New York.