Cagle speaks at Georgia Southern’s commencement

May 7, 2007

Georgia’s Lt. Gov. Casey Cagle was the speaker at Georgia Southern University’s commencement ceremony Saturday. Cagle, who invoked the memory of the university’s legendary football coach, Erk Russell, exhorted the graduating students to ‘live justly, love mercy, and walk humbly.” The three, he said, provide a framework for a life centered on what is truly important: a life focused on service to others.

During the ceremony, Georgia Southern awarded Hala G. Moddelmog, president and CEO of the Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation, an honorary doctor of letters. Moddelmog received her undergraduate degree from Georgia Southern in 1979.

‘Hala Moddelmog has consistently given back to her alma mater,” said Georgia Southern President Bruce Grube. ‘She served as executive in residence for the University’s Center for Retail Studies, and she was Alumna of the Year for the College of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences in 2001. A member of the Georgia Southern Foundation Board of Directors, she chaired the university’s first comprehensive capital campaign, which raised $53 million to support the university’s academic programming and scholarships.”

Following a successful career in the food service industry, Moddelmog was named president of Church’s Chicken in 1996. In 2006, she accepted a new calling and joined the Susan G. Komen Foundation in Dallas, Texas. A six-year breast cancer survivor herself, she is now responsible for all aspects of foundation management, along with the development and implementation of the foundation’s efforts to eliminate breast cancer.

Georgia Southern presented degrees to more than 2,300 doctoral, masters, and bachelors degree candidates. Now classified as a doctoral-research institution by the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, Georgia Southern is the largest and most comprehensive research institution in its region. A residential campus of nearly 17,000 students, the university offers more than 130 degrees programs, and it enrolls students from every U.S. state and more than 85 countries.

Georgia Southern’s Web site is www.georgiasouthern.edu.