Mary McAleese, Ireland‘s eighth and current president, will be delivering the commencement address to Mt. Holyoke College‘s graduating class on Sunday, May 24 during the school’s 172nd commencement.

‘We are honored to have President McAleese as commencement speaker,’ said Joanne Creighton, the president of Mt. Holyoke College, in a release. ‘In overcoming discrimination and adversity in Belfast and in rising to become a leader of the Irish people, she exemplifies all that we hope for in Mount Holyoke students: leadership and a commitment to purposeful engagement in the world. Many in Massachusetts, with our longstanding ties to Ireland, will look forward to her remarks with great anticipation.’

McAleese was elected for her first term in 1997 and her second in 2004. The Belfast native is the county’s first president to hail from the embattled northern region, and she matured during the country’s period of religiously motivated angst, known as ‘The Troubles.’

The progressively leaning politician has high approval ratings and is also known outside her country for her human rights work.

Former addresses include one at Villanova University in Pennsylvania where she was protested by religious conservatives. This was due to her adherence to Roman Catholicism, while spending time and effort working to promote privacy rights for homosexuals in her country. Many viewed this as hypocritical and not in line with the religion’s views.

Two other notable figures will be receiving degrees: Princess Lolowah al-Faisal al Saud, who founded the first private women’s university in Saudi Arabia, Effat University, and award winning biochemist Clare Waterman.

Lolowah al-Faisal Saud, in addition to being princess of Saudi Arabia and the general supervisor of Effat University, is also Co-Chair of the World Economic Forum Community of West and Islam Dialogue. Mount Holyoke currently has strong ties with the University, as its administrators and faculty played key roles in its development. Both universities are currently part of the Women’s Education Worldwide, an international grouping of women’s schools.

Clare Waterman is a tenured associate professor at the Kellogg School of Science and Technology at The Scripps Research Institute. She graduated from Mt. Holyoke in 1989, received her master’s degree from the University of Massachusetts and her Ph.D. from the University of Pennsylvania. She has received multiple awards, including the Director’s Pioneer award from the National Institutes of Health. She is an Established Investigator for the American Heart Association and is the current chief of the Laboratory of Cell and Tissue Morphodynamics at the NIH’s National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute.

Jon Peterson can be reached at [email protected].