The Claremont McKenna College Board of Trustees recently appointed Thomas C. Leppert ’77 a life trustee.
Leppert, who was elected mayor of Dallas in 2007, was a Claremont McKenna regular trustee for more than two decades.
Leppert boasts a distinguished business career, including serving as Chairman/CEO of The Turner Corporation, the nation’s largest general building company; CEO of Kaplan, Inc., the global multi-billion-dollar educational services company; CEO of Castle & Cooke Properties; and Vice Chairman of Pacific Century Financial Corp. and Bank of Hawaii. Earlier, he was a Principal with McKinsey & Co. He currently serves on the board of several public and private companies.
At CMC, Leppert majored in economics and served as ASCMC president. He earned an MBA with distinction at Harvard Business School in 1979. Leppert served as a White House Fellow in 1984.
In 2008, Leppert received an honorary degree from CMC. At the commencement ceremonies, he told graduates to "know your principles" and write them down. "This may sound simple and obvious, but over the course of a lifetime, it may be one of the most difficult promises you ever keep,” he said. “…People rarely get in trouble or lose their compass in one fell swoop... it is a series of small compromises, missteps that lead to a landslide... and a lost sense of self."
—Gilien Silsby