Lafayette President to be NCC Winter Commencement Speaker

Daniel H. Weiss, president of Lafayette College, will be the speaker at Northampton Community College's winter commencement, to take place on Jan. 26 at the Arthur L. Scott Spartan Center, 3835 Green Pond Road, Bethlehem Township.

Weiss earned an M.A. and a Ph.D. in art history at Johns Hopkins University, joining the faculty there in 1993. He also holds an M.B.A. from the Yale School of Management. He has a B.A. from George Washington University, where he graduated with a double major in art history and psychology.

From the Johns Hopkins University, where he was the James B. Knapp Dean of the Zanvyl Krieger School of Arts and Sciences, he came to Lafayette College as president in 2005. Under his leadership, Lafayette attained recognition for commitment to community service and economic revitalization. Weiss will leave Lafayette in July to become president of Haverford College.

In addition to being an educational leader, Weiss is a well-known authority on the art of medieval Europe in the age of the Crusades. He has written and edited several books and numerous articles on Romanesque, Gothic, Crusader art and the interaction of the Byzantine culture with that of the medieval west. He has also authored pieces on and gives lectures about American higher education and the Second World War.

In 1994, he won the Van Courtlandt Elliot Prize, awarded by the Medieval Academy of America. As a member of the Johns Hopkins faculty, he received three awards. Lafayette College chose him for the 2006 Aaron O. Hoff People's Choice Award. During that year, he also garnered the Community Partner Award from the Greater Lehigh Chamber of Commerce.

Weiss is active on community boards and is a member of the international advisory board of the Walters Art Museum in Baltimore.

Editor's Note: Information provided by NCC's Office of Public Information.