Award-winning journalist Jim Lehrer will deliver Penn’s 246th Commencement address in May. Lehrer, 67, the executive editor and anchor of “The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer” on PBS, will discuss how current events, such as the Sept. 11 tragedies, have reshaped the world.

A graduate of Victoria College and the University of Missouri School of Journalism, Lehrer worked as a newspaper reporter and editor before becoming the sole anchor of his own news program. An author and playwright, he has been honored with many awards, including two Emmys, a George Foster Peabody Broadcast Award, and induction into the Television Hall of Fame in 1999. He has also moderated the televised presidential debates for the last four elections.

Lehrer’s address to the Class of 2002 will put him on a list of famous Commencement speakers that includes U.S. Senator John McCain (R-Ariz.), poet and Nobel laureate Seamus Heaney and comedian Bill Cosby.