Google's Eric Schmidt double dips: To make second Virginia Tech commencement address

Google Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt has been named as the speaker for the 5,000-strong Virginia Tech Class of 2015 commencement on May 15 at Lane Stadium/Worsham Field.

Google Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt has been named as the speaker for the 5,000-strong Virginia Tech Class of 2015 commencement on May 15 at Lane Stadium/Worsham Field.

This marks the second time that Schmidt will deliver the commencement address at the Blacksburg, Va., school. Previously, he did so in 1999 as CEO of Novell.

Why the strong connection to the school? His father, Wilson, was the head of Virginia Tech's Department of Economics, and his family and that of former university President Paul Torgersen were neighbors.

RELATED: Top Techie College Commencement Speakers of 2014

What's more, Google's Schmidt donated $2 million to Virginia Tech in 2006 to endow the Paul and Dorothea Torgersen Dean's Chair in Engineering.

Eric Schmidt served as Google's CEO from 2001 to 2011. Earlier in this career, he was CTO at Sun Microsystems and served on the research staff at Xerox Palo Alto Research Center (PARC), Bell Laboratories, and Zilog.

He earned a bachelor's degree in electrical engineering from Princeton University as well as a master's degree and Ph.D. in computer science from the University of California, Berkeley.

Having Google on your resume is a good draw for the commencement speaking circuit. Megan Smith, ex-VP of new business development at Google and currently CTO of the United States, has been named as MIT's speaker this year.

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