UW Oshkosh student Donovan J. Johnson and UW Oshkosh Director of Equity and Affirmative Action Pamela Lassiter prepare to show a video clip of Dr. Martin Luther King., Jr.'s historic 1963 "I Have a Dream" speech at the 17th Annual Martin Luther King Jr. Community Celebration on Jan. 16.
Oshkosh 6th grade student Allison Voss’s essay suggests Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s hope for a free society built on respect will not fade.
“I wish I had the courage to do what Martin Luther King did. He wasn’t always respected, and yet he stood straight and tall and never gave up,” Voss, of Oshkosh’s Perry Tipler Middle School, wrote in her 1st place essay, recognized during the 17th Annual Martin Luther King, Jr. Community Celebration on Jan. 16.
An audience of about 260 guests, including faculty, staff and students from the host University of Wisconsin Oshkosh, Oshkosh civic and state legislative leaders, area business and agency executives and K-12 student essay-writers and their families gathered for the Community Celebration. The annual event, hosted by UW Oshkosh, is an opportunity for the community to reflect on its shared progress toward King’s dream of freedom and equality for all and recognize everyone from K-12 student essay winners and the vital agencies keeping the pursuit of dream alive.
UW Oshkosh Provost and Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs Lane Earns welcomed guests to Reeve Memorial Union and emphasized the University’s and community’s efforts in the last year to establish a more civil climate as part of a two-pronged campus-based and community-based civility initiative.
“It has been the aim of the Civility Project to develop ways to work collaboratively toward shared goals, even when individual opinions might differ,” Earns said. “These are the goals that Dr. King championed, as well, and they remain timely in our current state and national climate.”
Earns also excerpted a speech by former U.S. Rep. Barbara Jordan, a civil rights and Congressional pioneer who is this year’s honoree on the U.S. Postal Service Black Heritage Stamp, unveiled during the Community Celebration.
UW Oshkosh student and Black Student Union president Donavon J. Johnson introduced both a video excerpt of Dr. King’s historic 1963 “I Have a Dream” speech on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial and UW Oshkosh student Anthony Miller, who shared two original works of poetry.
In addition to student essay contest winners, the program included recognition of a handful of community agencies. Oshkosh City Manager Mark Rohloff awarded the new Day by Day Warming Shelter in Oshkosh, a nonprofit temporary emergency shelter for adult men and women with no other housing options, the evening’s Community Service Award.
The shelter opened this year and, with the help of a volunteer corps, has already provided 1,000 shelter nights and 2,000 meals.
“It has been an amazing thing, and Oshkosh should be proud of it,” said Tina Haffeman, of Oshkosh, a representative of ESTHER, Day by Day’s founding volunteer and activism organization.
Clarity Care, Inc., Legal Action of Wisconsin, Inc., Living Healthy Community Clinic, Tri-County Dental Clinic and the Winnebago County Literacy Council were also honored for their service to the community. The agencies’ missions range from providing safe, high-quality living and employment opportunities for adults with disabilities to legal services for low-income residents to low-cost health care options for the uninsured in northeastern Wisconsin.
This year’s student essay winners included: Brittany Diane Tracey, Sarah Beth Schuessler and Lyle Plueddeman, all from Oshkosh North High School; Alison Voss, Jason Dickerson and Brody Oreske, all from Perry Tipler Middle School; Ariana Jiricka of Oakwood Elementary School; Jenna Kiraly of Carl Traeger Elementary School; and Evan Clark of Webster Stanley Elementary School.
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