Howard A. Tullman will be the commencement speaker for the 2017–18 Commencement ceremony on Saturday, May 12, 2018.

Tullman is the chief executive officer of 1871—where digital startups get their start—and the general managing partner of Chicago High Tech Investment Partners as well as LLC and G2T3V, both Chicago-based venture capital funds. He most recently was the chairman and CEO of Tribeca Flashpoint College, which he co-founded in 2007. Tullman is the former president of Kendall College and the former chairman and CEO of Experiencia, Inc. Chairman of the Endowment Committee of Anshe Emet Synagogue, Tullman is a member of Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s ChicagoNEXT initiative and the City of Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events Cultural Advisory Council, the Innovate Illinois Advisory and the Illinois Arts Councils, and Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle’s New Media Council. He is also a member of the HighTower Advisors Advisory Board, Built in Chicago, and Imerman Angels. An adjunct professor at the Northwestern University Kellogg School of Management, he is a regular guest lecturer at the Northwestern University Pritzker School of Law. Tullman also serves as a director of Vehcon, Snapsheet, and Packback Books and has served as a longtime director and board chairman of The Cobalt Group. A trustee of the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, New York Academy of Art, and the Mary and Leigh Block Museum of Art at Northwestern University, he also serves as the lead director (and briefly, chairman) of The Princeton Review. Over the last 48 years Tullman has successfully founded more than a dozen high-tech companies.