RALEIGH — North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper will offer the commencement address at Campbell Law School’s 43rd annual hooding and graduation ceremony, Dean J. Rich Leonard announced today.
The event will be held at 10 a.m. on May 7 at Red Hat Amphitheater in downtown Raleigh.
“Gov. Cooper is a dedicated public servant, and we are delighted that someone of his prominence can join us for our commencement as we celebrate our 45th anniversary as a law school,” Leonard said. “In my view, Gov. Cooper has done a masterful job of guiding our state through the pandemic, and it is our great honor that he will join us for this special day.”
Strict COVID-19 protocols will be in place to protect the law school’s 167 graduates and their families, who will sit in separate pods scattered throughout the venue.
“Campbell Law School has produced thousands of well-prepared attorneys and public servants in our state including my wife, Kristin, who has been an excellent lawyer and guardian ad litem,” Cooper said. “I look forward to speaking with the next generation of Campbell Law graduates, leaders and their families.”
Cooper, who was first elected as the Old North State’s governor in 2016 and was re-elected in 2020, has spent nearly three decades in public service protecting families, keeping communities safe and working to create jobs and improve schools, according to his bio. The son of a school teacher, he knows that education creates opportunity and he has worked throughout his career to strengthen N.C. schools and create a sound foundation for the state’s children.
While serving in the N.C. House and Senate, Cooper fought to increase teacher pay and reduce class sizes. He wrote North Carolina’s first children’s health insurance initiative and worked with members of both parties to get balanced budgets that raised teacher pay to the national average, grow the economy and cut taxes for middle class families.
In 2000, he was elected as the state’s Attorney General, where he continued to fight for families during his four terms. He cracked down on child predators, worked to increase penalties for drug dealers and oversaw a sharp decrease in crime. He partnered with law enforcement and school administrators to make schools safer, and helped protect victims of domestic violence and stalking. He also made protecting consumers a priority, fighting to keep utility rates low, putting predatory lenders out of business and helping families fend off telemarketers.
He attended the University of North Carolina (UNC) at Chapel Hill on a Morehead Scholarship. After earning a law degree from UNC Law, Cooper returned home to Nash County to practice law and raise three daughters — Hilary, Natalie and Claire — with his wife Kristin Cooper ‘82, who is a current member of the law school’s Board of Visitors.
ABOUT CAMPBELL LAW
Since its founding in 1976, Campbell Law has developed lawyers who possess moral conviction, social compassion, and professional competence, and who view the law as a calling to serve others. Among its accolades, the school has been recognized by the American Bar Association (ABA) as having the nation’s top Professionalism Program and by the American Academy of Trial Lawyers for having the nation’s best Trial Advocacy Program. Campbell Law boasts more than 4,200 alumni, who make their home in nearly all 50 states and beyond. In 2021, Campbell Law is celebrating 45 years of graduating legal leaders and a dozen years of being located in a state-of-the-art facility in the heart of North Carolina’s Capital City.