2019 Commencement Speaker: Regina Hopper
Regina Hopper is currently senior vice president of global public policy for GRIDSMART
Technologies. In a career spanning work in the fields of transportation, telecommunications,
energy, media, communications and law she has become known as a leader in national
and state advocacy initiatives.
Prior to joining GRIDSMART, Hopper served as president and CEO of ITS America, the country's largest industry association advocating for research and deployment of intelligent transportation systems, president and CEO of America's Natural Gas Alliance, executive vice president of US Telecom and the American Trucking Association and senior vice president of litigation communications for Ryan McGinn. She has received many honors including the Gayle Pettus Pontz Award for women in law, serving as a University of Arkansas Johnson Fellow and being named a top CEO by CEO Update and The Hill.
Hopper is an Emmy Award-winning former network news correspondent for the CBS Evening News, CBS Morning News, CBS Weekend News, 48 Hours, and the CBS affiliate division Newspath. She covered the George H.W. Bush and William J. Clinton White Houses, and she anchored the network's overnight broadcast and reported on breaking news around the country from the New York and Washington, D.C., bureaus. She was awarded an Emmy for investigative reporting on 48 Hours.
Before heading to New York and Washington, D.C., she began her television career reporting for the ABC and CBS affiliates in Little Rock and practiced law with the then Little Rock law firm of Arnold, Grobmyer and Haley.
While in law school, Hopper was crowned Miss Arkansas and deferred school for a year to serve her term. As Miss Arkansas, she won the non-finalist talent award at the 1984 Miss America Competition and led that year’s Miss America USO overseas tour. As a former chair of the Miss America Foundation Board of Trustees and member of the Board of Directors of the Miss America Organization, she has recently re-joined the organization to assist in instituting new governance and management best practices serving as the organization’s volunteer president and CEO.
She is currently serving on the University of Arkansas Alumni Association Board of Directors and the Arkansas State Society Board of Directors.