Award-winning journalist Sonia Nazario will give the keynote address at Whittier College's 110th Commencement Ceremony on Friday, May 17, 9 a.m. in Memorial Stadium on the Whittier College campus. During the event, at which approximately 360 undergraduate and graduate students are expected to receive their degrees, Nazario will also receive an honorary degree from the Whittier College faculty: a doctorate of humane letters (L.H.D.).
Nazario is best known for her national bestselling book, Enrique's Journey: The Story of a Boy's Dangerous Odyssey to Reunite with His Mother, which tells the true story of an Honduran boy's struggle to find his mother in the United States.
"Enrique's Journey" first appeared as a series in the Los Angeles Times and won more than a dozen awards, including the Pulitzer Prize for feature writing in 2003, the George Polk Award for International Reporting, the Grand Prize of the Robert F. Kennedy Journalism Award, and the National Association of Hispanic Journalists Guillermo Martinez-Marquez Award for Overall Excellence. Expanded into a book, "Enrique's Journey" became a national bestseller, won three book awards, and was required reading for all incoming freshmen at nearly 60 universities and dozens of high schools nationwide. At Whittier, the book was widely read by the class of 2013 in preparation for a visit to campus by the author in 2009.
Read a recent op-ed piece by Nazario regarding immigrant children in the New York Times.
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