The Black History Month Keynote Address will feature Dr. Marc Lamont Hill, one of the leading intellectual voices in the country. He is the host of BET News, The Grio, Al Jazeera’s “Upfront,” and the “Coffee & Books” podcast. An award-winning journalist, Dr. Hill has received numerous prestigious awards from the National Association of Black Journalists, GLAAD, and the International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences.

Dr. Hill is a professor of urban education at the CUNY Graduate Center in New York City. Previously, he was the Steve Charles Professor of Media, Cities, and Solutions at Temple University. He has also held positions at Columbia University and Morehouse College.

Since his days as a youth in Philadelphia, Dr. Hill has been a social justice activist and organizer. He has worked on campaigns to end the death penalty, abolish prisons, and release numerous political prisoners. Dr. Hill has also worked in solidarity with human rights movements around the world. He is the founder and director of The People’s Education Center in Philadelphia, as well as the owner of Uncle Bobbie’s Coffee & Books. Ebony Magazine has named him one of America’s 100 most influential Black leaders.

Dr. Hill is the author or co-author of six books: the award-winning “Beats, Rhymes, and Classroom Life: Hip-Hop Pedagogy and the Politics of Identity;” “The Classroom and the Cell: Conversations on Black life in America;” “Nobody: Casualties of America’s War on The Vulnerable from Ferguson to Flint and Beyond;” “Gentrifier;” “We Still Here: Pandemic, Policing, Protest, and Possibility;” and “Except For Palestine: The Limits of Progressive Politics”. He has also published two edited books: “Media, Learning, and Sites of Possibility;” and “Schooling Hip-Hop: New Directions in Hip-Hop Based Education.”

Dr. Hill holds a Ph.D. with distinction from the University of Pennsylvania. His research agenda focuses on the intersections between culture, politics, and education in the United States and the Middle East.