Judge Greg Mathis is known for handing out rulings on his award-winning television show Judge Mathis, but in May he’ll be giving advice and looking forward at Concordia College Alabama’s graduation.

Mathis will serve as the keynote speaker at Concordia’s graduation on May 13 at 10 a.m.

The college will also award Mathis with an Honorary Doctor of Laws Degree.

Mathis’s public service career began in college where he led Free South Africa and voter registration campaigns on campus.

After graduating from college in 1983, he joined the staff of Detroit City councilman Clyde Cleveland and continued to work as an advocate for equal justice with the Rev. Jesse Jackson’s PUSH Excel, where he currently serves as chairman.

Judge Mathis has also served as a national board member of the NAACP and the Morehouse School of Medicine.

In his efforts to reach out to youth and ex-offenders both in and outside of the courtroom, Mathis opened the Mathis Community Center in his hometown of Detroit and has assisted thousands of youth with his nonprofit agency Young Adults Asserting Themselves (Y.A.A.T.), an agency that provides career, business start-up and job opportunities, as well as job training and college enrollment assistance.

Concordia’s commencement ceremony will take place in the college’s Julius and Mary Jenkins Center gymnasium, where an expected 64 students will receive diplomas in the areas of education, business administration, criminal justice, social and behavioral sciences, general studies and nursing.

Concordia will also award an Honorary Doctor of Letters to Mark Edward Stevens. Additionally, the Concordia class of 1967 (previously called Alabama Lutheran Academy and College) will be recognized for reaching their 50th year milestone.

The college will also continue its annual Presidential Scholars of the Future program, a tradition of honoring local elementary and high school students in grades 6-12 who have demonstrated academic excellence for the 2016-2017 academic year.