Carla Hayden, Ph.D., 14th Librarian of Congress, will return home, literally, to serve as Commencement speaker for both the Friday, Dec. 13 and Saturday, Dec. 14, 2019, ceremonies at FAMU. Hayden, a Tallahassee native, was born on the FAMU campus in the former FAMU Hospital (now Foote-Hilyer Administration Center).
Hayden is the first woman and the first African American to serve as Librarian of Congress, the largest library in the world. She was nominated to the position by President Barack Obama on February 24, 2016, and her nomination was confirmed by the U.S. Senate on July 13, 2016.
“It is my honor to be delivering the Commencement Address to the graduates of Florida A&M University,” Hayden said. “My ties are deeper because my father Bruce Hayden was recruited by the legendary Dr. William Patrick Foster, head of the University’s Music Department and Marching Band, to start a string program,” said Hayden, who grew up in Queens, N.Y., and later moved with her mother Colleen Dowling Hayden to Chicago.
“It will be wonderful to reconnect with the University accompanied by my mother who also taught music at John G. Riley Elementary School in Tallahassee.”
Hayden’s career as a librarian spans nearly half a century. She began with the Chicago Public Library as a library associate and children’s librarian in 1973. Later, she served as the young adult services coordinator from 1979 to 1982. For the next five years, Hayden was the library services coordinator for the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago.
Hayden also worked in academia. From 1987 to 1991, she was an assistant professor for Library and Information Science at the University of Pittsburgh. She then returned to her hometown, Chicago to work as deputy commissioner and chief librarian of the Chicago Public Library, a post she held from 1991 to 1993.
Prior to her present position in Washington, Hayden was CEO of the Enoch Pratt Free Library in Baltimore for 23 years.
Hayden received a B.A. from Roosevelt University and an M.A. and Ph.D. from the Graduate Library School of the University of Chicago.