Montverde Academy is pleased to announce that Hans Hanley will be the keynote speaker at the Academy’s 2023 Commencement Ceremony at 9:45 a.m. on Saturday, May 13, 2023, at The Mills Championship Court at the EdgeCenter for Sportsmanship and Wellness (The Nest).
Growing up in Orlando, Florida, Hans graduated from Montverde Academy in 2014 as valedictorian. Immediately afterwards, he attended Princeton University, graduating summa cum laude with a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering. While at Princeton, he was president of the local chapter of the National Society of Black Engineers and interned at various companies, including Google and Microsoft. Winning the Daniel M. Sachs Scholarship, Hans went abroad, receiving two master’s degrees with distinction in computer science and in statistics from the University of Oxford. Hans is currently a computer science Ph.D. candidate at Stanford University. His research focuses on natural language processing, computer security, and the spread of misinformation online. His research is supported by the Meta/Facebook Ph.D. Research Fellowship and the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship.
In an interview with Nyoshie Higgins, Montverde Academy’s Alumni Relations Coordinator, Hans shared that what drew him to the field of cybersecurity and issues related to online privacy were some of his experiences during his time at Oxford where he was able to see, first hand, the expanse of the internet and how much it affects other parts of the world. While there, he studied how certain societal issues exacerbated by the Internet not only affected the United States – they were global.
After Hans graduates with his Ph.D., he hopes to work in the private sector and do industry research or join a think tank. He is grateful for his time at Montverde Academy. “Whenever I talk to my mom and dad, they say, ‘Montverde Academy did so much for Hans. It was so transformative.’ To be fair, most of my hobbies and things that I do now are all things I learned while I was at Montverde Academy.”
Callie Day, a classically-trained opera singer, educator, artist, vocalist, and voice instructor, will be singing “You Raise Me Up” by Rolf Lovland and Brendan Graham at the Commencement.
Dr. Jeff Duke, Ed.D., author and founder of the 3D Institute, will be the keynote speaker at Montverde Academy’s Baccalaureate held the previous evening at 7 p.m. on Friday, May 12, 2023, at The Mills Championship Court at the EdgeCenter for Sportsmanship and Wellness.
Please note: The Academy’s Commencement Ceremony and Baccalaureate are closed to the public.