Mark your calendar and clear the day! The excitement is building for a full day of service, learning and celebration on and off campus Monday, January 21, in honor of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
A committee of students, faculty and staff have been working for months on a full slate of activities beginning Sunday with community worship and fellowship. Monday kicks off with an Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc. breakfast and ends with a showing of the movie “Hidden Figures,” about NASA mathematicians Katherine Johnson, Dorothy Vaughan and Mary Jackson.
Thanks to the hard-working MLK Day Committee, there is an activity or a service project for everyone to join in: contributing their energy and expertise to this day’s planning are Skyy Brinkley, Tah’je Coleman, Tae Dews, Teresa Haas, Roxy Kioko, Oksanna Kittrell, Gretchen Maust, Melody Pannell, Kimberly Schmidt, Andrew Suderman, Jakiran Richardson, Celeste Thomas and Precious Waddy.
One special event is the ribbon-cutting ceremony for the university’s new barbershop and salon in the campus center. Harrisonburg barber Tyrone Sprague, who traditionally hosted EMU visitors in his downtown barbershop on MLK Day, is coming to share wit, wisdom, history and legacy in EMU’s own new space, “The Royal Treatment.” This project was crowdfunded in record time by many donors who see the cultural significance of creating such a space on the EMU campus.
A racial equity institute will also be hosted by the Committee on Diversity and Inclusion. Read more here about this groundbreaking work that you can be a part of.
And don’t forget the time in the morning when the entire campus comes together.
“We are so excited to welcome our speaker for convocation, The Rev. Osagyefo Uhuru Sekou,” said Celeste Thomas, director of multicultural services and chair of the planning committee. “Come out for our traditional solidarity march to Lehman Auditorium, then join in our celebration of the life and legacy of Dr. King. This is always one of the most vibrant and inspiring celebrations on our campus, and Rev. Sekou is guaranteed to give us something more to think about. Come and meet him in the dining hall afterwards to talk more.”
Sekou, of St. Louis, Missouri, is an activist, theologian, author, documentary filmmaker, and musician. After Michael Brown Jr.’s killing, he travelled to Ferguson to organize alongside local and national groups on behalf of the Fellowship of Reconciliation, the country’s oldest interfaith peace organization. At that time, he was a Visiting Scholar at Stanford University’s Martin Luther King Education and Research Institute. He also spent six weeks in Charlottesville, Virginia, training clergy in response to the Unite the Right rally.
Among his many musical and cultural works are the May 2017 release “In Times Like These” produced the six-time Grammy nominated North Mississippi Allstars and several books on the topics of religion, democracy and culture, including the forthcoming Riot Music: Race, Hip Hop and the Meaning of the London Riots 2011 (Hamilton Books).
To learn more about his many academic, spiritual and artistic works, visit his website.
Check back for a complete schedule of activities!