Richard C. Gregory will be the speaker during Weatherly High School's 126th commencement ceremony on Friday.

The graduation will be held at 7 p.m. in the middle school auditorium.Gregory, the son of Richard and Barbara Gregory, was born and raised in Weatherly and graduated from Weatherly High School in 1990 with honors.Following graduation, he attended Pennsylvania State University, where he earned his bachelor of science degree in biology with a minor in molecular and cellular biology.Gregory remained at Penn State following graduation, where he studied red blood cell development and earned his Ph.D. in 1999. He then moved to Boston to continue his training as a research scientist at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Harvard Medical School as a postdoctoral fellow. His research was focused on understanding how cells repair their DNA following damage and how defects in these molecular pathways can lead to cancer.During this time, his research was supported by grants from the National Institutes of Health and American Cancer Society. Following his postdoctoral fellowship, Gregory was employed at Genzyme as a staff scientist II, where he led a laboratory focused on treating human diseases including chronic fibrosis, myocardial infarctions and cancer.He has remained at Genzyme, now part of Sanofi, and is nowa laboratory head in the oncology division, leading efforts to identify therapeutic targets for the treatment of cancer.During this time, he has published several peer-reviewed papers as an author and co-author and has presented at multiple scientific conferences.Gregory lives in Framingham, Massachusetts, with his wife, Karla, and two golden retrievers, Chloe and Barney.When not at work, he enjoys spending time on Cape Cod hiking, biking, skiing and spending time with his family.