Date: Feb 29, 2012

Cory Booker Featured Speaker at Hofstra’s P.R.I.D.E. Week

Feb. 29 address by Newark Mayor Kicks off Debate 2012 Programming .

Hofstra University, Hempstead, NY – Newark Mayor Cory Booker will be the keynote speaker for Hofstra’s annual P.R.I.D.E. week, extolling the value of community service, leadership and individual empowerment in an address that also kicks off the university’s Debate 2012- Pride, Politics & Policy program.

Booker’s speech, “Changing the World with Your Bare Hands”, and his background as a community leader and elected official who has championed bold reform measures during his two terms as mayor of New Jersey’s largest city, fits well with the themes of P.R.I.D.E Week, which focuses on the principles  that the Hofstra community is expected to uphold.  The event will take place on Wednesday, February 29, 2012, at 11:15 a.m. in the Helene Fortunoff Theatre in the Monroe Lecture Center, California Avenue, South Campus.  The program is sponsored by the Division of Student Affairs, the Hofstra Parent Council and the Office of University Relations.   

“We are thrilled to have Cory Booker come to campus as part of P.R.I.D.E. Week.” said Jayne Brownell, Assistant Vice President for Student Affairs and P.R.I.D.E. Week coordinator.  “The week celebrates and promotes Hofstra’s P.R.I.D.E. Principles, which represent core values of our community.  The principles that we are promoting, including personal and social responsibility; integrity, ethics and leadership; and diversity and community, are mirrored in the messages that Mayor Booker promotes in his work.  He is a perfect fit for the week, and we’ve been hearing a lot of excitement from students about his visit.”  The week is full of campus contests, speakers, and events all to educate and instill the principles into the student body.

Mayor Booker’s career began in 1998, after serving as Staff Attorney for the Urban Justice Center in Newark. He then continued his career as Newark’s Central Ward Councilman. During his four years of service from 1998-2002, then- Councilman Booker earned a reputation as a leader with innovative ideas and bold actions, from increasing security in public housing to creating new outdoor play space for the city’s youth.  For this work, he has been recognized in several publications, including, among others, TIME, Esquire, New Jersey Monthly (naming him as one of New Jersey’s top 40 under 40), Black Enterprise (naming him to the Hot List, America’s Most Powerful Players under 40) and The New York Times Magazine.

The Commission on Presidential Debates announced  on October 31, 2011 that it had chosen Hofstra University for the site of its October 16, 2012 Presidential Debate, which will be in the “town meeting” format.  An estimated 3,500 journalists came to Hofstra from throughout the nation and from around the world to cover the 2008 final Presidential Debate, between then Senator Barack Obama and Senator John McCain, on October 15, 2008.  Mayor Booker’s address is the first in a series of educational and community events Hofstra is planning in conjunction with the presidential debate. Find out more by visiting the Debate 2012 site.

Hofstra University is a dynamic private institution where students can choose from about 140 undergraduate and more than 150 graduate programs in liberal arts and sciences, business; engineering; communication; education, health and human services; and honors studies, as well as a School of Law and the Hofstra North Shore-LIJ School of Medicine.

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