President and CEO of the NAACP **Cornell William Brooks** spoke at his alma mater, the Boston University School of Theology, on Transformational Leadership. Prior to leading the NAACP, President Brooks led the New Jersey Institute for Social Justice, where he directed the Institute’s successful efforts to win the passage of three landmark prisoner reentry bills in 2010, hailed by The New York Times as, “a model for the rest of the nation.” Brooks has also served as Executive Director of the Fair Housing Council of Greater Washington, Vice-Chair of the New Jersey Public Broadcasting Authority, Second Vice-Chair of the East Orange General Hospital Board of Trustees. His 1987 MDiv from BUSTH focused in social ethics and systematic theology.
Cornell William Brooks is the president and CEO of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), the nation’s oldest, largest, and most widely respected grassroots-based civil rights organization. A graduate of Head Start and Yale Law School, Brooks considers himself “a grandson, heir and a beneficiary” of the landmark decision Brown v. Board of Education argued by legendary NAACP litigator Thurgood Marshall. As a civil rights attorney, social justice advocate, fourth-generation ordained minister and coalition-builder, Brooks’ life and experience exemplify the NAACP’s mission to secure political, educational, social, and economic equality for all citizens. Prior to joining the NAACP, Brooks led the Newark-based New Jersey Institute for Social Justice as president and CEO.