 us today as we celebrate the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Many of you have already participated in various activities this morning, whether it be through educational sessions sponsored by faculty, staff and alumni or service opportunities planned by our excellent staff through our service learning office. This afternoon, we will continue the second half of our campus tradition tradition of remembering the tenants and values of Martin Luther King Jr. across our NCSSM community. As we deem this day as a day on and we term it as a celebration, let us not just in there. Instead, let us also embody and embrace those tenants and those values. Let us activate those values in our daily operations here at NCSSM. Let us activate those tenants and those values, not just in how we interact with our peers and coworkers, but also in how we, in how and what we don't say, but how we think about others. Let us critically analyze how we come to our own conclusions and how we define others. And why is that? Because you never know how someone else lives. We aren't privy to their personal journeys. We aren't experts in others and their challenges and their struggles. This is what makes what we're doing today so special. If we do it right, this is what makes the legacy of Martin Luther King so imperative. So what are those values? What are those tenants? Martin Luther King believed in hope. There's a quote that says, we must, that he said that we must accept finite disappointment, but never lose infinite hope. Never lose that anticipated desire that something is going to happen. While we go through our struggles, while we go through our circumstances, while we may be upset, there are times where we're frustrated, but that we don't lose sight of our end goal. Martin Luther King was inspirational. There's a quote that says, if you can't fly, then run. If you can't run, then walk. If you can't crawl, I mean, if you can't walk, then crawl. But whatever you do, you keep moving. Let us inspire one another in that way. At the same time, he believed in empowerment and also believed in courage. He said, let us never, never be afraid to do what's right, especially if the well-being of a person or animal, sometimes we miss that point, or animal is at stake. Society's punishments are small compared to the ones we inflict on our soul when we look the other way. Let us be courageous in our approach. He believed in the life and life of others. He wrote, we must learn to live together as brothers, or together we're going to perish as fools. Martin Luther King was an anti-racist. He believed in peaceful protests, freedom, and love. He believed in it while also understanding the cost of being vocal about just those things. So I encourage you to let us remember that today, but also let us embrace that today in a very real way. Now, am I asking you to lay your life down as Martin Luther King did? No. I am asking that you give up something. Think about what you can give up today, but also in the future. Sacrifice something. Sacrifice your self pride and replace it with humility. Think about maybe your way isn't the right way. Maybe this is the time to shift our thinking and change our mind. Sacrifice the desire to speak. Sometimes sacrifice the desire to even criticize. There is so much beauty in just listening. Listening to others. If we could just embody that, we could stimulate for our community belonging. We can also nurture our abilities to thrive here at NCSSM and beyond. So as it relates to listening, just speaking about listening, we're going to listen. We're going to take a moment and we're going to listen. We have two presentations that we're going to move forward with. First, you will hear a recording from our color's choir. And then after the choir, we will have a student presentation from Ella Rose Holly class of 2025. My name is Ella Rose Holly and today I'm going to be speaking about Martin Luther King and some of the stuff surrounding what was going on during that time. So Martin Luther King was an activist, a minister, a philosopher and a leader. And on this day, especially as well as all other days, it is very important to remember all the people who were involved in this movement. On the morning of September 15, the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama was getting ready for their youth worship service where Martin Luther King had given his speech, I Have a Dream, 18 Days Ago. At 10.22 a.m. just as the service had started, the church exploded. And later after doing several investigations and they detected that four Ku Klux Klan members had set bombs in retaliation to the civil rights movement that was going on. The poem I'm reading is called The Ballad of Birmingham and it was written in the remembrance of four of the children who died that day, 11 year old Denise McNair, 14 year old Cynthia Wesley, Carol Robertson and Addie Mae Collins. There was an estimated two dozen people that were injured, including Addie Mae's younger sister, Sarah Jean. She lost her vision in both of her eyes and years later she did talk about the incident and she said that she remembers Dennis asked Addie Mae to tie the bow on her dress. But as she went to tie the ribbon, the bombs went off and her friend and her sister lost their lives that day right in front of her. So this is a poem that was written about the bombing of the church and it is from the perspective of a mother, which is very important because it shows how everybody was really affected, especially the black community was affected by everything that was going on during the civil rights movement. And so this is the poem. It says, mother, dear, may I go downtown instead of out to play and march the streets of Birmingham in a freedom march today. No, baby, you may not go for the dogs are fierce and wild and clubs and hoses guns and jails aren't good for a little child. But mother, I won't be alone other children will go with me and march the streets of Birmingham to make our country free. No, you may not go for I fear those guns will fire but instead you may go to church and sing in the children's choir. She has calmed and brushed her night dark hair and bathed rose petals sweet and drawn white gloves on her small brown hands and white shoes on her feet. The mother smiled to know her child was in the sacred place, but that smile was the last mile to come upon her face. For when she heard the explosion, her eyes grew wet and wild and she raced through the streets of Birmingham calling for her child. She clawed through the bits of glass and brick then lifted out a shoe. Oh, here's the shoe, my baby wore, but baby, where are you? And this is very important because it shows how everyone was involved. And church was supposed to be a safe place, but everything was being disrupted during this time. Good morning to everyone. Thanks, L. Rose, for your poem and words. We really appreciate you taking the time to do that. And I'm very happy to be here this morning with all of our students, faculty and staff and our guests to welcome you to this year's NCSSM celebration, the life and work of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. It's wonderful to have everyone with us virtually this morning. And thank you, as Miss Butler said, for your participation today in community learning sessions and for your service to our communities. I'd also like to take a moment just to thank Miss Butler and Sue Ann Lewis, Liz Peoples, Johnny Estrada, Jenny Merrill, Terry Lynch, our IT teams and student life teams for their leadership and efforts in planning this year's celebration of the life and work of Dr. King. Typically, each year we recognize the keeper of the dream recipients at the end of the program. This year, we're changing that order a little bit and I'm going to do that now. Each year, the planning committee for this day accepts nominations for the keeper of the dream award. This award is given to an employee or friend of the school who, during their service to the institution and school community, has facilitated positive race relations or exhibited leadership in advancing mutual respect, understanding, and appreciation for cultural and ethnic diversity, or encouraged and engaged in off-campus outreach activities and exemplified compassion, goodwill, courage, or leadership. Several individuals were nominated for their effort and worked towards these causes, which is fantastic that we have so many that are doing great things like this. The work that these individuals are doing is important and we'd like to thank those who nominated them and acknowledge their great work. In reading the nominations for this year's awardees, what was written about these two people really resonated with me in thinking about the theme of today and my remarks, which center on belonging and also Dr. King's belief that we should be working toward what he termed the beloved community. What people do, each of us does, is critical to creating a community where we all feel a sense of belonging and through their work and who they are as people, our keeper of the dream awardees exemplify what it means to help others feel and gain a sense of belonging in our community. Our first recipient is Ginny Estrada. Ginny is the assistant director for student services on NCSSM's Morganton campus. Ginny's nominators had this to say about her and their nomination of her for this award. Ginny has supported all students and Latinx students in particular since her arrival to campus. She consistently encourages the Latin American Cultures Club to bring an intersectional analysis to their events and club goals. From one-on-one mentorship to workshops at all student meetings, from training staff to disciplinary meetings, from teaching a Res Ed class to organize an MLK's days of service, Ginny approaches her work with profound intention and deep listening. I'm sure that whoever interacts with Ginny leaves the interaction with clarity and her graceful warmth. I'm grateful to be a colleague with Ginny and for the support she has also provided to the spectrum alliance. Ginny is not afraid of difficult conversations or sensitive topics and has our community's best interest at heart. She's become the person students go to, particularly minoritized students. Although juggling multiple tasks, programs, and at times various jobs it seems, she always makes time to give full attention to her students. Her energy and genuine care has the ability to ease at the same time and power those that feel disenfranchised at moments. It's my honor to recognize Ginny Estrada for the Keeper of the Dream Award. Congratulations, Ginny. I know that Ginny is currently traveling for J-term and is not on the line, but when you see her, please give her your thanks for the work she does and congratulate her on being recognized as one of this year's Keeper of the Dream awardees. Our second recipient this year is Dr. Jamie Lathan, who's the Vice Chancellor for Extended Learning. The nominator wrote, It's a common experience for a child to have a role model as they grow up. While some may admire Superman for his strength or Harriet Tubman for her courage, I looked up to Beyoncé Knowles Carter. As a superstar who became world renowned for being a single lady who knew that girls run the world, she represented the fact that a little black girl like me could get up and chase her dreams while also wearing snazzy shoes. It was this mindset that was integral to my NCSSM application. Attending a high school where I could count the number of black students on one hand, I was one of three applicants, two white males and myself. I had never paid them much attention in the past to interfere with my self-perception, but after hearing about their AP classes, varsity sports, and awards, I began to feel like maybe I wasn't made to be a woman in the field of science. I had worked hard, but it seemed to always appear that they were somehow better than me. The key in that, though, is the word appear. Maybe it was I woke up like this playing through my airpods as I raced both of them at track practice or meditating on the fact that I am black girl magic, but the day I received that green checks status update, I felt like there was power within me. I was capable of things beyond my imagination. I had just never been given the opportunity. My parents' mental list of my little quirks is extensive. However, at the very top is what I like to call chronic curiosity. I've always been the kid to continuously ask why, after any claim, watch documentaries for fun and get lost in her thoughts. It was when my mother told me about a summer research program for rising NCSSM juniors that I felt as if my curiosity could get me somewhere. I signed up in the hopes of meeting members of my graduating class unaware of the experience to come. It later hit me that this wasn't just a research program, but it was a research program for underrepresented NCSSM students. I've never been in an environment where my blackness was actually recognized. It was during that week that I not only met my closest friends and embarked on my first ever research project, Aquaculture and Sustainable Farmated NC State University, which I would continue until December of 2023. I met the person behind this life-changing experience, Dr. Jamie Latham. Dr. Latham puts his whole heart and soul into all that he does, and it surely doesn't go unnoticed. Spearheading numerous diversity, equity, and inclusion-centered activities and initiatives for NCSSM, he cares for his community, and most importantly, he cares for those who are underrepresented. He advocates for what he believes in and continues to enact changes in small in ways big and small. Not only have I had the opportunity to bond with him during my research program, but I became a leader for that same program. I've watched him work tirelessly, tirelessly fighting both systemic and social issues. Just to give students like me a little blackhead a chance to realize their full potential. Because of Dr. Latham, I've become an avid public health researcher, both at NCSSM and NC State, but also at our, and also at our RTI. Dr. Latham sees the potential to be great in every student's eyes and will burn the midnight oil to keep their light aflame. He inspires me daily, whether it be his welcoming smile or productive professionalism, to go above and beyond to better the world for both myself and my community. He's the type of leader that we need more of today, the type of leader who isn't scared of the challenges ahead because their passion is their greatest defense. I have Dr. Latham to thank for my success, my realization of my potential and the impact that I will have on generations to come. He's my new Beyonce. He's my role model. It's my honor to recognize Dr. Jamie Latham with the Keeper of the Dream Award. Congratulations, Jamie. Oh, enough Jamie's on the line. I am Dr. Roberts. Thank you so much. It's so, so humbling to hear that. I am not Beyonce in the lead, so I apologize if you're expecting someone to look like Beyonce, but I'm just so grateful to be a part of this community, committed to honoring the work of Dr. King and his legacy and grateful for Jaini and the other nominees for this award. So thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you, Dr. Latham. So when we celebrate the life of Dr. King each year on this day for his efforts to ensure that all people in this country have the ability to live their lives and pursue passions and achieve their dreams based on their abilities and character, not the color of their skin. In the nearly 56 years since Dr. King's death, there's certainly been hard-won progress made in increasing the rights and opportunities for many people who prior to his work enjoyed little or none. That's why when we look back and count the progress, we celebrate Dr. King's legacy. But what we're also celebrating is the struggle and leadership it took to bring change to our nation. Yet when we think about today and look forward, I hope we all understand that the work that is left to all of us to do if we hope to realize his dream. As we continue our steps today to do this, it takes individuals committed to this work, just like Jaini and Jamie, to make progress toward Dr. King's dream. Dr. King's dream was the beloved community, a society based on justice, the inherent worth of others, inclusiveness, and a love of one's fellow human being. The beloved community King it's aspired to is not utopia, but it's something achievable where we still have conflict but are able to resolve these peacefully. According to reaching such a community, to becoming such a community is having all members know that they belong, all members included. Certainly I think that all of us online today believe that the beloved community as described by Dr. King is aspirational. Whether we think that more broadly from the perspective of where we are today as a nation or world, or in our own NCSSM community, there's much work to do. I'm proud of the work we've done and are doing at NCSSM to celebrate the wonderful diversity we enjoy in our institution and to make our community inclusive. A place where each person knows they belong, no matter the race, gender identity, sexual orientation, whether you're from rural or urban North Carolina. Our work on equity, diversity, and inclusion through the years has been a core part of our strategic plan. The focus of this work has been to make sure our community, which we are blessed as wonderfully diverse, is also consciously inclusive. The nomination of Dr. Lathan for the Keeper of the Dream highlighted just one of the efforts our school makes to help create a sense of belonging for our students. Our summer leadership and research program, which was referenced in the nomination, has been doing this for 17 years and it's clearly impactful. While recent laws and court cases are making us adjust incredibly impactful programs such as this, they do not change our commitment to doing the work we need to do to make sure we have the same impact for students in our community, so that we can continue narrowing the gap between where we are today as a community and the aspirational beloved community. Our working creating a community of belonging should always be aspirational, striving to be better. While we have so much to be grateful for in our community, we know that ours is not a community absent of discord or challenge. One of the tenets found in Dr. King's writings is the idea of peace, not peace where there's an absence of conflict or tension, but peace where there's justice, where people with differences, whether those are based on who they are, what they believe, can through dialogue seek to understand and address these differences and move beyond conflict. Dr. King referred to this as positive peace. In our society today, I believe we struggle to have the type of dialogue necessary to work toward understanding positive peace. You see it play out daily in just about every setting. It seems like the argument is the goal, not dialogue to seek understanding in common ground. From my perspective, the ability to achieve some sort of positive peace and move toward a more beloved community where there's justice for all, there must be personal commitment and commitments by institutions. Personal commitment is what each of us does, the responsibility we take for how we act when people are looking and whether or not. It's how we act with one another. Do our actions promote a community of togetherness where we learn from one another's cultures, gifts and talents, and through our actions promote understanding and compassion, or do our actions cause others pain and cause others to withdraw from our community? Our actions, what each of us choose to do, either adds to or detracts from creating a community of belonging. When I speak with alumni from NCSSM for across the 43 years of our school, I hear a variety of stories. I hear about the activities, the classes, the people that they remember most fondly. Almost always it is the people that they remember most, whether they graduated 10 years ago or 40 years ago. Alumni speak of the diversity of their classmates and how what they learned from them was as important as the diversity of learning opportunities that they had in the unique and amazing classes that they took. That is why what we do each day matters. It matters for the community we create now, but also the impact of the community now will have on each of us in the years to come. I'm amazed by the work that our students do each day, both formally and what I see you do for one another and to help create positive campus climate. That's why when I hear of things that some people do that run counter to creating a community of belonging, it's deeply disappointing. Actions that are meant to hurt others are not acceptable in this community or any other. If actions are intentional that raises questions in my mind about whether the person who takes those actions should actually be a member of this community. If unintentional but still hurtful, there's the opportunity for dialogue and learning that comes when we work for a positive peace. The community of belonging is made up of those who recognize personal responsibility, who they are and what they do, and how their actions help shape their community. Institutions also bear responsibility for creating a place and climate where all members can thrive. The idea of the beloved community as aspirational is how we think about our institution. This means continuing to understand what we do well and understand how we can continue to improve and do better. Our commitment as an institution to have a community for all members have a sense of belonging is clear in our strategic plan. It's how we as an institution in each of us that live this that is most important as we continue our journey. I feel fortunate to have the opportunity to work in a place like this for as long as I have that has quarter to its mission improving the opportunities and lives of those in our state. We have the great opportunity and great responsibility to make sure this means everyone. That is the beauty of what we can do. We serve all of North Carolina and benefit as an institution from doing so. We have the privilege of having incredibly talented, diverse and diverse faculty and staff who get to work with diverse students from all over our state. If you're not a football fan and particularly a Michigan football fan, you may not get this reference, but as Jim Harbaugh says, who has it better than we do? We are unique in this opportunity and responsibility. How can we ensure for the time each of us is here that we're doing this to the best of our abilities while we are here and making while we're here and making sure that we make our institution even better prepared to do so in the future. There are always those things that impact what we can and can't do, things that we must address. This has been true over the past 43 years of NCSSM's existence. Sometimes these challenges are greater or less, but challenges are meant to be overcome. They don't stop the good work we do to help ensure we can fully meet our mission to serve amazing and talented students from all over our state in an environment where they can all thrive. It's up to each of us and all of us together to make sure we do this in the time that we're here. It's been nearly 56 years since Dr. King died fighting for what he believed to be possible. A country and world where equality and inclusiveness were not a dream but a reality. I hope that when you're my age that one of you might be speaking to the classes of 2064 and 2065 celebrating this day for what we have done to realize Dr. King's dream of a more beloved community. And you're marveling at how NCSSM has helped lead the way in this effort close to home and our own campus and across our state. So again, I would like to take an opportunity to thank the colors wire for recording that video to help us get the day started and for Ella for her presentation and again congratulate Jynie and Jamie for their recognition and what they do day in and day out in our community along with all of you to keep faith with Dr. King's dream and our beloved community. I also want to again say thanks to Jamie Butler and the many people who helped plan today's event and each of you in the community for being engaged today and a day on at NCSSM. I hope that all of you our students faculty and staff will come together and join together for our Unity lunch today at noon in our dining halls on both campus campuses. We have more to do today and I look forward to seeing you at lunch. We have more to do as we look forward to the future for the rest of this year and beyond. So thank you again for helping us celebrate and recognize the work and life of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. today. Thank you very much.