Freeman Alphonsa Hrabowski III (born August 13, 1950) is an American educator, advocate, and mathematician. In May 1992, he began his term as president of the University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC), one of the twelve public universities composing the University System of Maryland. Hrabowski has been credited with transforming UMBC into an institution noted for research and innovation. Under his leadership, UMBC was ranked the #1 Up and Coming University in the U.S. for six consecutive years (2009-2014) by the U.S. News & World Report magazine. When that designation was retired, U.S. News & World Report began including UMBC on its annual Most Innovative National Universities list. His research and publications focus on science and math education, with a special emphasis on minority participation and performance in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM). Hrabowski is the co-author of the books Beating the Odds: Raising Academically Successful African American Males (1998); Overcoming the Odds: Raising Academically Successful African American Young Women (2001); Holding Fast to Dreams: Empowering Youth from the Civil Rights Crusade to STEM (2015); and The Empowered University: Shared Leadership, Culture Change, and Academic Success (2019). Hrabowski chaired the National Academies committee that produced the report Expanding Underrepresented Minority Participation: America's Science and Technology Talent at the Crossroads. In 2012, President Barack Obama appointed Hrabowski to chair of the newly created President's Advisory Commission on Educational Excellence for African Americans. Publications have named him one of America's best leaders, one of the 100 most influential people in the world, and one of America's 10 best college presidents. In 2011, Hrabowski received the Carnegie Corporation of New York's Academic Leadership Award, one of the highest honors given to an educator. Early life and education Hrabowski was born in segregated Birmingham, Al, the only child of his parents, both of whom were educators. His mother was an English teacher who became a math teacher, and his father was a math teacher who went to work at a steel mill. Frequently asked about the origin of his unusual surname, Hrabowski explains that he is the great-great-grandson of Eaton Hrabowski, a slave owned by and named for Polish-American slave owner Samuel Hrabowski. In a CBS television interview, Hrabowski recounted that he is the third Freeman Hrabowski; his grandfather was the first Freeman Hrabowski born a free man, as opposed to having to be freed. When he was 12 years old, in 1963,