By Jadyn Giles
Long Beach State’s ASI and Black Resource Center are preparing to kick off their 26th annual Martin Luther King Jr. celebration event in honor of Black History Month.
Since 1999, students and staff come together annually to celebrate the legacy of MLK and honor the five founders of this ongoing CSULB tradition. The founders are five Black female faculty members recognized by the names of Valerie Bordeaux, Renee McDonald, Marie Burks, Ruby Leavell-Hartley and Carol Brown Elston.
The MLK Celebration is a free informational event, open to all students, staff, and faculty. The purpose of this event is to honor the past while leaning into the future generation’s dreams to help create a bright and impactful future.
“The three components of this event are to celebrate, educate and dream,” Paul Carter, assistant director of the Black Resource Center, said. “We strive to keep the dream alive.”
The event structure typically remains the same because the committee tries to maintain the event’s history. Many traditional elements have been carried on over the years, including singing the Black national anthem, keynote speakers, roundtable discussions and cake cutting.
The ever changing element of the celebration is who the guest speaker is.
This year’s guest speaker is Kayla Mason, a regional director at Hidden Genius Project, a nonprofit organization dedicated to preparing young Black men for the field of STEM.
As stated on the organization’s website, “Black male youth demand, and are working towards, a future where their genius is celebrated, realized, shines every day, and is no longer hidden, suppressed or belittled.”
The Hidden Genius Project also states that tech is the future, and STEM opportunities have become the fastest growing area of employment. Insight will be given to encourage all black youth to continue to move forward and grow with the ever-changing world of technology.
Although the event structure remains similar to how it once was in 1999, the content changes to keep up with the growth within the Black community.
Each year, the planning committee chooses a quote from Martin Luther King Jr. and bases the program’s content around it. In the celebration’s recent history, the planning committee has chosen a quote that aligns with the nationwide Black History Month theme of the corresponding year.
While history is an important component of this event, the planning committee makes it a point to move forward.
“A committee of people comes together with hopes of bridging the gap between MLK’s work in the past and the dreams of the future generation,” Carter said.
Each year, the event concludes with singing happy birthday and cutting a cake to honor MLK.
“We sing the version of happy birthday that Stevie Wonder wrote,” Carter said. “He wrote it to support the campaign to make Martin Luther King Jr.’s birthday a national holiday.”
Stop by the USU Ballrooms on Feb. 6 from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. to enjoy an afternoon filled with learning, celebration and inspiration.
