FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: Maya Matthews Minter
Phone: 703.385.2411
Email: Maya@TheEDULedger.com
Dr. Arnold L. Mitchem to receive the 2026 Dr. John Hope Franklin Award on April 12 during AABHE annual meeting
FAIRFAX, Va. — The EDU Ledger is pleased to announce the presentation of this year’s Dr. John Hope Franklin Award to Dr. Arnold L. Mitchem.
Mitchem is the founding president emeritus of the Council for Opportunity in Education (COE) and has demonstrated a lifelong commitment to helping the disadvantaged and the poor.
As a pioneering leader he has shaped countless pieces of legislation and been an unrelenting voice for low-income, first-generation students and individuals with disabilities throughout his career. Under his helm, federally funded TRIO Programs were expanded by nearly 400% to serve more than 872,000 students at 1,200 colleges and universities.
He began his career on the history faculty at Marquette University in Milwaukee and was named director of the Educational Opportunity Program in 1969. He relocated to Washington, D.C. in 1986 to serve as the first president of COE. In 2013, he stepped down after 32 years at the helm of the organization that has educated and lobbied members of Congress and executive branch officials to ensure TRIO program continuity and expansion.
Among his numerous appointments and awards, Mitchem has been awarded honorary doctorates from: CUNY-Lehman College in New York; DePaul University; the University of Illinois, Champaign-Urbana; the University of Liverpool, England, Marquette University; Marycrest College; the University of Massachusetts at Boston; Lewis University; St. Joseph University in Philadelphia; St. Louis University, SUNY Buffalo State; and Colorado State University Pubelo.
Mitchem graduated from the University of Southern Colorado (now Colorado State University Pueblo), studied European history as a Woodrow Wilson Fellow at the University of Wisconsin, and received his doctoral degree in foundations of education from Marquette University.
Award Presentation:
The presentation of the award medallion will take place at the Baltimore Hilton, Inner Harbor in Baltimore, Maryland at 6 p.m. EST, on Sunday, April 12 during the American Association of Blacks in Higher Education (AABHE) annual meeting, to register click here. Mitchem will also be featured in the April 2, 2026 print issue of The EDU Ledger.
About this Award:
The Dr. John Hope Franklin Award was created in 2004 to pay tribute to Dr. Franklin, historian, writer, educator, and humanitarian who made significant contributions to shaping the perspective of American history in the 20th century.
With the late Dr. Franklin’s permission, THE EDU Ledger created the award to institutionalize and celebrate his scholarly contributions to the nation on an ongoing basis. The individuals and organizations chosen are those whose contributions to higher education are consistent with the highest standards of excellence.
Past recipients have included, among others, the late Dr. Norman C. Francis, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the late Dr. Maya Angelou, Dr. Arturo Madrid, Dr. Shirley Ann Jackson and Dr. Johnnetta B. Cole.
For more than four decades, The EDU Ledger has been dedicated to expanding educational opportunity and advancing the success of students, faculty, staff, and administrators across the higher education landscape. Our editorial mission is to deliver comprehensive, research-informed coverage that goes beyond surface-level storytelling — offering deep analysis rooted in institutional and national data, and revealing both the outcomes and the context behind them.
