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Roosevelt University is proud to announce Christopher G. Kennedy as its Fall 2018 Commencement speaker. Kennedy is the founder and chairman of Top Box Foods, an anti-hunger not-for-profit social business, and treasurer for the Joseph P. Kennedy Jr. Foundation, which works to improve the lives of people with intellectual disabilities through funding, programming and advocacy.

A former member of the Executive Committee for the Chicago Community Trust, Kennedy moved to Illinois in the 1980s to learn the fundamentals of food distribution in the United States, and he ultimately served as chairman of the Greater Chicago Food Depository. In 2009, he was appointed to the Board of Trustees at the University of Illinois. Kennedy spent the final decade of his 25-year career at MMPI as president, where he ran The Merchandise Mart in Chicago, which became the world’s largest LEED-certified building.

He is the lead independent director for Interface, one of the most sustainable manufacturers in the country, and is a trustee of Ariel Investments Mutual Fund, where he chairs the Audit Committee of the nation’s largest African American-owned mutual fund. Kennedy also serves on the board for Knoll, a leader in furniture design and sustainability.

Katia and Samantha Martinez, twin sisters who immigrated from Mexico when they were both five years old, will deliver the student Commencement address.

Dylan Warren, a Roosevelt University senior paralegal studies major, political science minor, and Honors program member, was appointed a Student Laureate for The Lincoln Academy of Illinois, Class of 2018.

November 12, 2018 — As part of its American Dream Reconsidered Conference lecture series, Roosevelt University will host a conversation between Cook County Clerk David Orr and Ralph Martire, Arthur Rubloff Professor of Public Policy and Public Administration at Roosevelt.