Mr. Speaker

Entrepreneur (Bloomberg L.P., the financial-information and news company), civic leader (three-time mayor of New York City), and philanthropist (including gifts of $1.1 billion to his alma mater, Johns Hopkins) Michael R. Bloomberg, M.B.A. ’66 [5], will be the principal speaker at the 363rd Commencement, on May 29 [6]. Born in Boston and raised in nearby Medford, Bloomberg returned to the area for his business degree—and has supported the Business School with a professorship and a gift for the renovated Baker Library|Bloomberg Center, both named in honor of his father, William Henry Bloomberg. He has spoken out nationally on issues such as gun control and public health; during his commencement address at Stanford last year (“no other university in the world has so profoundly shaped our modern age”), he advocated immigration reform, as a linchpin of economic growth, and same-sex marriage, as a basic civil right. Bloomberg will speak that afternoon, during Harvard Alumni Association’s annual meeting, following the Morning Exercises.