Marc Morial ’76 will speak at the luncheon.

The Class of 2017, Jesuit’s largest graduating class ever, will be welcomed into the Alumni Association at the 16^th annual Commencement Luncheon on April 28, 2017, in the Bienville Room at the Mercedes-Benz Superdome. The coat and tie affair begins at 11:30 a.m. and ends at 1 p.m. Tickets are $40 each and may be purchased online. Parking in the Dome is available for $15.

RSVP online as soon as possible.

The 290 seniors will be joined by alumni from the 1940s to the 2010s to celebrate being an alumnus of Jesuit High School. The soon-to-be alumni and the actual alumni will sit together at tables of ten to share stories of life at Carrollton and Banks, stories from yesterday and today. The Luncheon will include remarks from Marc Bonifacic ’92, president of the Alumni Association.

A special feature of the event is an address by a noted alumnus, who speaks on the significance of being a Blue Jay. This year the Honorable Marc Morial ’76, former mayor of New Orleans and current president of the National Urban League, will address the Jays.

Morial brings a wealth of experience in public service to the podium. Entrepreneur. Attorney. Professor. Legislator. Mayor. President, U.S. Conference of Mayors. CEO of the National Urban League, the nation’s largest civil rights organization. His is a distinguished professional career spanning 25 years in servant-leadership.

He was also one of the youngest lawyers, at age 26, to argue and win a major case before the Louisiana Supreme Court. As a professor, Morial served on the adjunct faculty of Xavier University in Louisiana, where he taught constitutional law and business law. In Louisiana State Senate, Morial was named Legislative Rookie of the Year, Education Senator of the Year, and Environmental Senator of the Year.

As mayor of New Orleans in the 1990s, Morial was successful in reducing violent crime, the unemployment rate, and the city’s poverty rate. In his tenure the Convention Center was expanded, the downtown casino and sports arena opened, and the Charlotte Hornets relocated to the city.

In 2003, Morial became president of the National Urban League. During his tenure as president, the 100 year-old civil rights organization has expanded to include an empowerment agenda to close the economic gaps between whites and blacks, as well as rich and poor Americans. Specifically, he has created the Urban Youth Empowerment Program to assist young adults in securing sustainable jobs, Entrepreneurship Centers in five cities to help the growth of small businesses, and the National Urban League Empowerment Fund, which has pumped almost $200 million into urban impact businesses including minority businesses through both debt and equity investments.

After Jesuit, Morial earned dual degrees in Economics and African American Studies from the University of Pennsylvania and then a law degree from Georgetown University.

He serves as an executive committee member of the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights, the Black Leadership Forum; also, he is a board member of the Muhammad Ali Center and the New Jersey Performing Arts Center.

In Jesuit’s 2012 celebration of the 50^th anniversary of the school’s desegregation, Morial was an important advisor to the school and participant in the events.