President Barack Obama has scheduled his final presidential college commencement addresses, the White House said Thursday.
The President will begin his annual round of graduation remarks on May 7 at Howard University in Washington, his third commencement address at a historically black college.
A week later he’ll speak at Rutgers University’s 250th anniversary commencement ceremony, held on the public research university’s campus in New Brunswick, New Jersey.
And he’ll continue his yearly tradition of addressing graduates of a U.S. military service academy on June 2, speaking to cadets at the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs. He last spoke at the Air Force academy commencement in 2012.
Obama is a highly sought after graduation speaker every year, choosing only a few schools among the hundreds that petition for his presence. Rutgers’ president wrote Obama three years ago requesting he speak at their landmark anniversary.
In past years, Obama has traveled to colleges or high schools in Arizona, Indiana, Michigan, Virginia, New York, Florida, Tennessee, Ohio, Georgia, Massachusetts, California and South Dakota to deliver commencement remarks. After this year, he’ll have spoken twice at all four military academies.
First lady Michelle Obama and Vice President Joe Biden will also travel to address graduating seniors this spring. The first lady will visit an historically black institution — Jackson State University, in Mississippi — as well as the Santa Fe Indian School in New Mexico and the City College of New York in Harlem.
Biden will speak in his home state, at Delaware State University, and at the Syracuse University School of Law, which both he and his late son, Beau, attended. He’ll also address cadets at the U.S. Military Academy in West Point, New York.
One school you won’t see Obama delivering remarks at this year: Sidwell Friends in Washington, where his oldest daughter Malia is a senior. In January he was overheard telling guests at lunch in Detroit that he’d be too emotional to speak.
“Malia’s school asked if I wanted to speak at commencement and I said no,” Obama said. “I’m going to be wearing dark glasses … and I’m going to cry.”