The 17th annual Champaign Countywide Martin Luther King Jr. Celebration will be held 4 p.m. Jan. 12 at the Vineyard Church, 1500 N Lincoln Ave. in Urbana, a release posted on the city of Urbana website said.
The theme this year is “Fifty Years Past, Fifty Years Forward … Our Future Dreamers," and the day’s events will focus on the youth in Champaign, Urbana and Rantoul middle and high schools.
Sally Carter, founder and chief executive of Tap in Leadership Academy is slated to be the keynote speaker. The academy provides local children with the opportunity to learn leadership skills and develop new perspectives about themselves and the world around them through after-school and summer programs.
Youth who have made an impact on their community will be honored by the Celebration Committee in a variety of categories. Awards will go to the youth who has demonstrated a desire for effective communication and problem-solving leading to nonviolent solutions, the youth who has a high standard of integrity and wants to spread a mindset of social justice in their community, the youth who shows a passion for bringing their peers together and finding common ground despite different backgrounds and experiences and to the youth who actively goes out of their way to uplift their peers, the release said.
The event is free and open to the public. For more information, go to www.mlkcelebration.org.
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