Martin Luther King, Jr. (MLK) Day is celebrated on the third Monday of January each year. The day honors his life and legacy in the fight for Civil Rights.

Although John Carroll received January 16 off from school in honor of Dr. King, JC students and staff members honored him in the following days.

On January 17, advisors were encouraged to speak about Dr. King and his accomplishments and service. Additionally, during the week, many posters of Dr. King and his inspiring quotes lined the windows of the main hallway.

Social Studies Department Chairman Rodney Johnson taught his students a mini-lesson on MLK on the day they returned from the three-day weekend.

Mr. Johnson said, “The lesson went into more detail than [his] ‘I Have a Dream’ speech. There’s so much more to Dr. King than “I Have a Dream.’”

“I focused on the aspects of [Dr. King’s] ministry that really called for a radical love, and that he was looking for social justice, political justice, as well as economic justice. I also went into some detail about how the FBI targeted him,” Mr. Johnson said.

He also emphasized Dr. King’s persistence. “He was arrested nearly 30 times. He survived a bombing at his house. Despite all of these things that were done to him by our society, he never wavered in his convictions.”

Mr. Johnson hopes that his students take away a deeper message to his lesson. “Despite the strides that have been made in the last 50 or 60 years, there’s still a lot of work to be done. Until there’s a genuine reckoning, [and] until individuals are able to listen, I really don’t think his vision of reconciliation is possible.”

Sophomore Kathryn Hemphill, one of Mr. Johnson’s students, enjoyed the lesson “very much.” She said, “It was interesting to hear more about MLK than just the regular stories that we always hear.”

Social Studies Teacher Gretta DeMennato wore an MLK-inspired t-shirt on Tuesday, January 17. The t-shirt displayed Dr. King’s famous “Darkness” quote which begins “Darkness cannot put out darkness; only light can do that.”

Dr. King’s quote has left a powerful impression on Mrs. DeMennato. “To me, darkness represents not being in relationship with God. If we know that we’re all made in the image of God, then treating someone as an ‘other’ is turning our back on God—and that’s when the darkness happens.”

However, she added that the shirt also represents “light, love, and knowledge of however we should treat each other.”

Like Mr. Johnson, Mrs. DeMennato spent class time educating her students about Dr. King. She showed them a 1970 clip of “The Ed Sullivan Show,” two years after Dr. King was assassinated. “In 1970, Ed Sullivan had Coretta Scott King to come on his show to talk about her husband,” Mrs. DeMennato said.

After Mrs. King finishes speaking about her husband, Sullivan “touches her arm, holds her hand, and kisses her on the cheek after he speaks to her.”

Mrs. DeMennato said, “It was a powerful popular cultural moment in which a white man showed what Dr. King and his wife wanted for the world and what the whole Civil Rights Movement was about.”

“I hadn’t heard much about Coretta Scott King’s work before, but watching that video opened my eyes to both her public speaking skills and the heavy grief she must have felt upon MLK’s death,” said AP U.S. History Student Al Riska.

MLK Day is an important time for the community to reflect on MLK’s efforts and achievements in support of social justice.