The annual Martin Luther King, Jr. Commemoration at Cornell provides a public, campus based forum that makes accessible the life and legacy of Dr. King for contemporary times.
This year's King Commemoration speaker, Dr. Eboo Patel, Founder and Executive Director of the Interfaith Youth Core (IFYC) based in Chicago, is a legatee of the King commitment to an inclusive society and world. Named by US News & World Report as one of America's Best Leaders of 2009, Dr. Patel is author of the award-winning book Acts of Faith: The Story of an American Muslim, the Struggle for the Soul of a Generation. He is also a regular contributor to the Washington Post, National Public Radio, USA Today and CNN. He served on President Obama's Advisory Council of the White House Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnership and holds a doctorate in the sociology of religion from Oxford University, where he studied on a Rhodes scholarship.