MLK Regional Celebration

2026 Martin Luther King Jr. Regional Celebration

Thursday, January 22 at 7pm
Malcolm Field Theatre, Curtiss Hall

The event is open to the public.

Cynthia “Cynt” Marshall

President & CEO, Marshalling Resources
Consultant and Former CEO of the Dallas Mavericks
Retired AT&T Executive
Author

Cynt Marshall has been a dynamic force in business over a 36-year career at AT&T and almost seven years as the CEO of the Dallas Mavericks. Cynt has been a champion for achieving business results through inclusion and a relentless focus on people and operational excellence.

Prior to her joining the Mavs, Cynt founded Marshalling Resources, a consulting firm specializing in leadership development, culture transformation and optimization of people resources.

As Senior Vice President – Human Resources & Chief Diversity Officer, Cynt led the team that created a world class culture and also spearheaded the work that for the first time placed AT&T on Fortune’s 100 Best Companies to Work For list in 2017, one of only two Fortune 50 companies. She’s had similar results with her clients at Marshalling Resources.

Cynt also served as President-AT&T North Carolina where she became the first African-American chair of the North Carolina State Chamber of Commerce.

Widely recognized for her visionary leadership and ability to get things done, Cynt is the recipient of several honors and awards, including the 2024 Junior Achievement Dallas Business Hall of Fame Laureate award and the 2022 Dallas Holocaust and Human Rights Museum Hope for Humanity award. In 2021, Forbes named Cynt one of 15 of the world’s most inspiring female leaders.

A graduate of the University of California at Berkeley with degrees in Business Administration and Human Resources Management, Cynt is also the recipient of five honorary doctorate degrees. She serves on four corporate boards and on several non-profit boards, including Dallas CASA, UC Berkeley Board of Visitors, and the Dallas Regional Chamber where Cynt is the immediate past chair of the board. Cynt is also on the board and the co-founder of Pro Sports Assembly and recently named to The Naismith Memorial Hall of Fame Board of Governors. In May 2025, Cynt was named Cal Alumni of the Year.

Cynt’s first book, You’ve Been Chosen, was released in September 2022 and nominated for an NAACP Image award. She grew up in Richmond, California, and lives in Dallas, Texas. Cynt and her husband, Kenneth Marshall, have four adult children.

2025 Martin Luther King, Jr. Regional Celebration

Wednesday, January 22, 2025, at 7 p.m.
Malcolm Field Theatre, Curtiss Hall

Nontombi Naomi Tutu
Race & Gender Justice Activist

This event is open to all, and no advance registration is necessary.

The challenges of growing up black and female in apartheid South Africa have been the foundation of the Rev. Nontombi Naomi Tutu’s life as a motivational speaker and activist for human rights. Those experiences taught her that our whole human family loses when we accept situations of oppression, and how the teaching and preaching of hate and division injure us all.

She started her public speaking as a college student at Berea College in Kentucky in the 1970s when she was invited to speak at churches, community groups and colleges and universities about her experiences growing up in apartheid South Africa. She has since become a much sought-after speaker to a wide variety of business associations, professional conferences, elected officials and church and civic organizations.

The Rev. Tutu knew from the time she was young that she wanted to help change the lives of others and make a difference in the world. But she wanted to carve her own path. And that she has done.

This event will feature:

• Keynote Address — the Rev. Nontombi Naomi Tutu
• Presentation of the MLK Scholarship Awards
• Presentation of the Regional Drum Major Awards