Wake Forest’s Dr. Michael Lamb tapped as Maryville College Class of 2025’s Commencement speaker
Feb. 8, 2025
Dr. Michael Lamb, the F.M. Kirby Foundation Chair of Leadership and Character as well as the executive director of the Program for Leadership and Character and associate professor of Interdisciplinary Humanities at Wake Forest University, will deliver the commencement address to the Maryville College Class of 2025 during a ceremony scheduled for 10 a.m. Saturday, May 3, in Humphreys Court on the MC campus.
As part of the program, Lamb will receive an honorary doctor of humane letters degree from the 206-year-old liberal arts college. Few candidates, MC President Dr. Bryan Coker pointed out, better exemplify College founder Rev. Isaac Anderson’s call for individuals to “do good on the large possible scale” than Lamb.
“Dr. Michael Lamb is a strong advocate for a liberal arts education, and a believer in the critical skills that students gain from such an education,” Coker said. “As our students stand on the precipice of life beyond college, I want them to recognize and embrace all they possess, as liberal arts graduates — our nation and world need what our graduates offer, as independent thinkers and engaged citizens.”
As a scholar and educator, Lamb’s research focuses on the ethics of citizenship and the role of virtues in public life, and his own educational journey is a blueprint for those inspired by a lifelong quest for knowledge. He holds a bachelor’s degree in political science from Rhodes College, a second bachelor’s in philosophy and theology from the University of Oxford (where he studied as a Rhodes Scholar), and a Ph.D. in politics from Princeton University. His book, A Commonwealth of Hope: Augustine’s Political Thought, was published by Princeton University Press in 2022; in it, Lamb interprets the political thought process of St. Augustine of Hippo to explore how his virtue of hope might inform contemporary politics.
“I am very honored and grateful to be invited to give the 2025 commencement address at Maryville College,” Lamb said. “As a native Tennessean who attended a liberal arts college, I have long admired the transformative liberal arts education that Maryville provides to its students and look forward to congratulating graduates on their accomplishments as they seek to use their talents and education to do good in the world.”
Lamb also served as the co-editor of three other books, including The Arts of Leading: Perspectives from the Humanities and the Liberal Arts, published in 2024 by Georgetown University Press; Cultivating Virtue in the University, released by Oxford University Press in 2022; and Everyday Ethics: The Moral Theology and the Practices of Ordinary Life, published by Georgetown University Press in 2019. In addition to having his work published in a number of edited volumes and academic journals, he has won teaching awards from Oxford, Princeton and Wake Forest, including an award for a course that explores what commencement speeches can teach listeners about character.
In addition, he has put his education to work by advising universities on character education and civic engagement and serving as chief of staff for various political campaigns in Tennessee. At the University of Oxford, he helped launch the Oxford Character Project, which assists graduate students in various fields, from government to law to medicine and more, to think about the role of ethics in their professions. At Wake Forest, he is leading efforts to foster leadership and character on campus and beyond. The principal investigator on grants from Lilly Endowment Inc. totaling more than $43 million, he helped to create the Educating Character Initiative, which is supporting a national network of colleges and universities focused on cultivating character.
“I believe the Class of 2025 will find Michael’s personal story inspiring — he’s a native Tennessean, whose own liberal arts college experience led to his remarkable journey, as a Rhodes Scholar, Oxford and Princeton alumnus, and now, a Wake Forest faculty member leading a national network focused on character in higher education,” Coker said.