WSSU and WFU team up to honor Martin Luther King, Jr.

Moved and inspired by the life and legacy of civil rights leader Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., many attended celebrations last month in his honor on campus and throughout the city.

Winston-Salem State University and Wake Forest University (WFU) hosted a fifth annual joint celebration that began with a dinner where the "Building the Dream" Award was introduced to the annual event. It ended with an "On Common Ground" book signing by King's daughter, Bernice King.

The "Building the Dream" Award was established to honor one professor or administrator and one student from either WSSU or WFU who exemplifies the ideals that King embodied and ultimately died for.

Both recipients of the award were from WSSU: freshman psychology major Carlton Brunson and Esther Powell, director of Graduate Studies. They were selected by the Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Joint Programming Committee.

It was wonderful to be a recipient of the "Building the Dream" award, said Powell, who has worked at the university for 22 years.

"Becoming the recipient of the award is most humbling," she said. "I feel truly honored and blessed to receive an award that is associated with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. His work was of such great magnitude."

The city of Winston-Salem also held the 27th annual Noon Hour Commemoration of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. at the M.C. Benton Convention Center where the WSSU chapter of the NAACP ushered.

The WSSU chapter of the NAACP had 15 members to participate in the event, according to sophomore LaMonica Moore.

"I was honored that we were asked to be a part of the commemoration because it was in celebration of Dr. King," the 20-year-old business major said. "This is something that is big in the Winston-Salem area and so it was a great accomplishment for our chapter to be a part of it."

Approximately 1,700 audience members attended and were challenged to live together, learn together and love together by Rev. Dr. James Donald Ballard, pastor emeritus of the United Metropolitan Baptist Church.

"I stand on a summit today, from which I can view an America that has all the potential to eradicate every artificial barrier which separates, divides and diminishes her citizens and erect a strong boundary that can unify, enhance and construct a commonwealth in which there will really be a nation and one nation only under God, indivisible with liberty and justice for all," said Ballard.

Mutter D. Evans, the founding organizer of the annual noon hour commemoration, said commemorating Dr. King is important be cause he gave everything, including his life, for liberties we now take for granted.

"If we do not appreciate and understand our history, we can't go forward," Evans said. "We take to many things for granted. If it's a mistake and you don't understand it, you are bound to repeat it, nor can you repeat the successes if you don't understand those things as well."