The inaugural Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Symposium at the University of Colorado at Boulder, "Revitalizing the Spirit of Resistance, Activism and Service," will be held Jan. 18-20.
The symposium will offer a variety of workshops and presentations on topics such as leadership, health, education and social movements. All events are free and open to the public.
State Sen. Peter Groff, founder and executive director of the University of Denver Center for African American Policy, will deliver the keynote address on Thursday, Jan. 20, at 5:45 p.m. at Old Main Chapel. A reception will follow at the Heritage Center.
"Martin Luther King Jr. established a living legacy that serves as a guiding principle for many CU-Boulder community members who engage in the fight against injustice and the struggle for freedom, equality and dignity of all people," said Loretta Wahl, university counselor at the Center for Multicultural Affairs and chair of the symposium planning committee.
"It is our hope to establish an annual event that informs on Dr. King's life and legacy and how it continues to impact social movements today," she said.
The symposium opens Tuesday, Jan. 18, at 6 p.m. in the Glenn Miller Ballroom at the University Memorial Center and will feature poetry readings, monologue presentations, African American historian and storyteller Cassandra Sewell and the CU-Boulder Umoja Voices Gospel Choir.
Events on Wednesday, Jan. 19, will begin at 10 a.m. at the UMC and include a variety of workshops conducted by CU-Boulder faculty, staff and students and the Rocky Mountain Peace and Justice Center, among others.
The celebrated documentary, "Eyes on the Prize," a history of the civil rights movement, also will be shown throughout the day. A dramatic performance by Wardenburg Health Center's Interactive Theater Project, "Echoes of King's Holiday," will be held at 6 p.m. followed by a discussion on race facilitated by the CU Dialogue Network.
Additional workshops will be held on Thursday, Jan. 20, from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. at the UMC including "A Dream Deferred: The Racial Inequality and Health Care in America" presented by CU-Boulder Law Professor Dayna Matthew, CU-Denver and Health Sciences Center Professor Robert Winn and health care professional and educator Carla King, a CU-Health Sciences Center alumna. The symposium will close with Groff's speech at Old Main Chapel.
The King Center's pledge of nonviolence in honor of Martin Luther King Jr. will be available at the sessions. For more information and the schedule of events, visit the Center for Multicultural affairs Web site at . The site will be updated as sessions are finalized.
Sponsors of the symposium include the Center for Multicultural Affairs, the Office of Diversity and Equity, the Office of the Associate Vice Chancellor for Faculty Affairs and the CU-Boulder Black Alumni Society.
For more information contact Wahl at (303) 492-5718.