The Honorable Hazel R. O’Leary, who became the 14th President of Fisk University in 2004, is a woman who has blazed a trail in the areas of education, energy, the environment, and business. After 25 years of experience in the field of law, energy, and environmental policy development and implementation, Hazel O’Leary became the first African American, first woman, and energy executive to become the Secretary of the Department of Energy. She served during the first term of the Clinton Administration.

Among her accomplishments as a Cabinet Member, she structured the debate and analysis of the technical basis for President Clinton’s stand on opposing nuclear testing. At the Department of Energy she led an agency of 120,000 people and directed a budget of nearly $21 billion. Her work has been recognized with such honors as “Person of the Week” by ABC News, the Averell Harriman Award and one of 100 “fearless” women in the United States by Mirabella magazine. She graduated cum laude from Fisk University, where she was inducted into Phi Beta Kappa. She earned a Juris Doctorate degree from Rutgers University School of Law, Newark, while her son, Carl, was in preschool. In her talk, Damned if We Don’t: America’s Imminent Need for Leadership and Service, President O’Leary will discuss the need for leadership and service at the national and global levels. She will explore how college campuses can incorporate these important topics into the classroom and campus activities as a foundation for future work.

  This lecture is free and open to the public.

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