'On Topic with Ken Starr' To Feature Conversation with Condoleezza Rice

November 3, 2011

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Former U.S. Secretary of State joins Baylor President in engaging conversation about her new book, her service to the country and important issues facing the nation

Baylor University President Ken Starr will welcome Condoleezza Rice, Ph.D., 66th U.S. Secretary of State and the nation's first female National Security Advisor, to the Baylor campus for "On Topic With President Ken Starr," a series of compelling conversations on contemporary issues, at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, Nov. 9, in Waco Hall on the Baylor campus. The event is free and open to the public.

Rice - who now serves as professor of Political Economy in the Graduate School of Business, The Thomas and Barbara Stephenson Senior Fellow on Public Policy at the Hoover Institution and professor of Political Science at Stanford University - is the author of the newly released book, No Higher Honor, A Memoir of My Years in Washington. The memoir is a vivid and forthright account of Rice's experiences as U.S. National Security Advisor and Secretary of State during the administration of President George W. Bush.

Starr and Rice will engage in a conversation about her new book, her service to the United States and vital issues facing the nation.

"It is an honor to welcome Dr. Condoleezza Rice back to Baylor. Our university hosted Dr. Rice on numerous occasions during the administration of President George W. Bush, and it is a great privilege to have her on our campus once again," President Starr said. "As a member of the Bush Administration, Dr. Rice was one of the President's closest confidantes, administering U.S. foreign policy during one of the most challenging periods in contemporary American history. Dr. Rice served our nation with great resolve and intelligence during the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, events she recounts with great candor in her new memoire. We look forward to a fascinating evening of conversation with this outstanding public servant, distinguished academic, award-winning teacher and expert commentator on U.S. and international affairs."

Autographed copies of No Higher Honor are available for pre-order through the Baylor University Bookstore in person at 1201 S. Fifth Street or online at www.baylor.edu/bookstore

. Pre-ordered books will be available for pickup on the night of the event beginning at 5:30 p.m. in the foyer of Waco Hall. A limited number of autographed books may also be available for sale in the foyer of Waco Hall on the night of the event.

From 2001 through 2004, Rice served as the nation's first female National Security Advisor, and in 2005, she was confirmed as the 66th U.S. Secretary of State. As America's chief diplomat, Rice traveled almost continuously around the globe seeking common ground among friends, allies and sometimes bitter enemies, forging international agreements on divisive issues and compiling a remarkable record of achievement.

In No Higher Honor, Rice shares her unique perspective on the most consequential political, diplomatic and security issues of the administration. In her own words, she describes the harrowing terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and chronicles her experience of appearing before the 9/11 Commission, for which she was broadly saluted for her grace and forthrightness. She also reveals new details about the contentious debates in the lead-up to the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Offering keen insight into how history actually proceeds, No Higher Honor reveals the behind-the-scenes maneuvers that kept the world's relationships with Iran, North Korea, and Libya from collapsing into chaos. The book also takes the reader into secret negotiating rooms where the fates of Israel, the Palestinian Authority, and Lebanon often hung in the balance, and draws back the curtain on how frighteningly close all-out war loomed in clashes involving India and Pakistan, Russia and Georgia, and in East Africa.

Surprisingly candid in her narrative of administration colleagues, as well as the hundreds of foreign leaders with whom she dealt, Rice offers in No Higher Honor a master class in statecraft and diplomacy in a way that reveals her essential warmth and humility, and her deep reverence for the ideals on which America was founded. No Higher Honor will be, undoubtedly, an important contribution to the historical record of the United States.

Rice's previous memoir Extraordinary, Ordinary People: A Memoir of Family, an account of her upbringing in segregation-era Birmingham, Ala., and of the lasting influence her parents had on her life, was published by Crown in October 2010, and appeared on the New York Times, USA Today, Wall Street Journal and Denver Post bestseller lists.

Rice served as Stanford University's Provost from 1993-1999, during which she was the institution's chief budget and academic officer. As Provost, she was responsible for a $1.5 billion annual budget and the academic program involving 1,400 faculty members and 14,000 students.

From 1989 through March 1991, Rice served on President George H.W. Bush's National Security Council staff. She served as Director, Senior Director of Soviet and East European Affairs and Special Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs. In 1986, while an international affairs fellow of the Council on Foreign Relations, Rice also served as Special Assistant to the Director of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

As professor of political science, Rice has been on the Stanford faculty since 1981 and has won two of the highest teaching honors - the 1984 Walter J. Gores Award for Excellence in Teaching and the 1993 School of Humanities and Sciences Dean's Award for Distinguished Teaching.

She has authored and co-authored numerous books, including the bestselling Extraordinary, Ordinary People: A Memoir of Family (2010); Germany Unified and Europe Transformed: A Study in Statecraft (1995) with Philip Zelikow; The Gorbachev Era (1986) with Alexander Dallin; and Uncertain Allegiance: The Soviet Union and the Czechoslovak Army (1984).

In 1991, Rice co-founded the Center for a New Generation, an innovative, after-school academic enrichment program for students in East Palo Alto and East Menlo Park, Calif. In 1996, CNG merged with the Boys and Girls Club of the Peninsula (an affiliate club of the Boys and Girls Club of America) of which she remains actively involved in today.

Rice currently serves on the board of C3, an energy software company, and Makena Capital, a private endowment firm. In addition, she is a member of the boards of the Commonwealth Club, the Aspen Institute, the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, and the Boys and Girls Clubs of America. Rice has also served on various additional boards, including those of the Chevron Corp., the Charles Schwab Corp., the Transamerica Corp., the University of Notre Dame and the San Francisco Symphony Board of Governors.

Rice earned her bachelor's degree in political science, cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa, from the University of Denver, her master's from the University of Notre Dame and her Ph.D. from the Graduate School of International Studies at the University of Denver.

Rice is a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and has been awarded 10 honorary doctorates.

Starr's inaugural "On Topic" conversation was held in March 2011 with guest T. Boone Pickens, best-selling author, financier and alternative energy proponent.

ABOUT BAYLOR

Baylor University is a private Christian university and a nationally ranked research institution, characterized as having "high research activity" by the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching. The university provides a vibrant campus community for approximately 15,000 students by blending interdisciplinary research with an international reputation for educational excellence and a faculty commitment to teaching and scholarship. Chartered in 1845 by the Republic of Texas through the efforts of Baptist pioneers, Baylor is the oldest continually operating university in Texas. Located in Waco, Baylor welcomes students from all 50 states and more than 80 countries to study a broad range of degrees among its 11 nationally recognized academic divisions.

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