From homeless to Harvard: Liz Murray headlines HCC's Dillon Lecture Series

Liz Murray, who was homeless at 15 yet finished high school in two years and earned a full scholarship to Harvard, is the speaker for Hutchinson Community College's Dillon Lecture Series, according to the college.

Her speaker biography says Murray was raised in the Bronx by two loving but drug-addicted parents and grew up in poverty, often without enough food and chronically absent from school. By 15, her mother had died, and Murray was living on the streets, riding the subway all night and eating from dumpsters. With support from Arthur, an upstairs neighbor and trusted family friend, she completed high school and won the Harvard scholarship while camping out in New York City parks and subway stations.

"I started to grasp the value of the lessons learned while living on the streets. I knew after overcoming those daily obstacles that next to nothing could hold me down," Murray is quoted as saying in the biography.

Murray is now an advocate for underserved youth and speaks on personal motivation, transforming problems into opportunities and what it takes to make a difference in people's lives.

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