Jackson State University President Carolyn W. Meyers received an honorary doctoral degree from the prestigious Pardee RAND Graduate School in Santa Monica, Calif., on June 18.
Meyers, who was selected based on her lifetime of achievements in education, participated in a policy panel discussion moderated by Pardee RAND Graduate School dean Susan L. Marquis. Meyers was joined on the panel by Dr. Arthur Brooks, president of American Enterprise Institute, and Warren Olney, host of KCRW’s “To The Point.”
Other degree recipients included Joseph Newhouse, a John D. MacArthur professor of Health Policy and Management at Harvard University and former director for the RAND Health Insurance Experiment. Congressman and civil rights leader John Lewis was also honored and served as the commencement keynote speaker.
According to the RAND Graduate School, Meyers is an honorary degree recipient because of “the transformational change she has brought to this historically black university – change that we learned about through her connection with RAND’s Gulf States office and which has been highlighted in the book ‘The Revolution in Higher Education by Richard DeMillo.’ ”
Furthermore, RAND acknowledged the more than 30 years of academic and administrative leadership Meyers brought to JSU.