Michelle LaVaughn Robinson Obama is the current First Lady of the United States of America and the wife of President Barack Obama, the current and 44th president of the United States.
Michelle Obama was born in Chicago, Illinois on January 17th, 1964. A descendant of African-American slaves, Obama grew up in a tight knit family on the south side of Chicago. She and her brother were both very intelligent, even skipping the 2nd grade. In the sixth grade she was placed in the gifted class and went on to be an honor roll student all of her four years at Whitney Young High School. Her ability to exceed was evident in high school as she was a member of the National Honor Society, earned the position of student council treasurer, and even graduated as the class of 1981’s salutatorian.
She padded her educational resume by entering Princeton University where she majored in sociology and minored in African American studies. She graduated in 1985 cum laude with a Bachelor of Arts degree.
Obama then went on to Harvard Law School and graduated in 1988 with a Juris Doctor degree.
Her law degree led to her working at the law firm Sidley Austin along with another young lawyer named Barack Obama, who would in October of 1992 would become her husband. Together they would have two daughters, Malia (b. July 4th 1998) and Sasha (b. June 10th, 2001).
Over the subsequent years, she would hold a few jobs in the Chicago area. Those jobs would include, Assistant to the Mayor, Assistant Commissioner of Planning and Development, Executive Director for the Chicago Office of Public Allies, Associate Dean of Student Services at the University of Chicago, Vice President for Community and External Affairs for the University of Chicago Hospitals, and a board member for TreeHouse Foods Inc.
In addition to her own work, Michelle Obama has also supported her husband’s political campaigns as well. She had been active in campaigning for her husband since early in his career in politics, including his run for the United States House of Representatives in 2000.
And after her husband’s successful campaign for US Presidency in 2008, Michelle Obama became the first African-American First Lady when Barack Obama took office on January 20th, 2009.
