College Honors MLK with Day of Service Events

On Wednesday, the Office of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (ODEI) hosted the MLK Day of Service and Action, a day to honor Martin Luther King Jr’s legacy through providing the Amherst College community opportunities to volunteer on and off campus and engage in dialogue. This is the second time the event has been held on campus, the first occurring in 2023.

The Day of Service gave the campus community the opportunity to recognize and emphasize the importance of Martin Luther King Jr. Day and King’s vision of social justice. Although the holiday is celebrated nationwide on the third Monday in January, the Amherst event was held this month to allow more students to attend, having returned from winter break.

The event offered many opportunities for members of the Amherst community to engage in both acts of service and in dialogue with various professors across campus and the town. Events included distributing food at the Bangs Community Center or through Not Bread Alone, as well as creating blankets for community members with Fiber Friends CRG (Colleague Resources Group), as well as discussing MLK’s Beyond Vietnam Speech with Associate Professor Sony Coráñez Bolton.

Fiber Friends CRG held their event on the first floor of the science center, where a table was set up for attendees to sit together and crochet community blankets. Individuals each made their own smaller segments, called “granny squares,” that will be placed into blankets that will soon be donated to a local organization.

Cami Nakagawa ’27, who contributed to a blanket, said that the event was engaging. “It was cool that we can create something that someone else can use, even if you don’t know anything about how to crochet,” she said.“It was a great way to give back, and to make something and let someone else enjoy it.”

The Women’s and Gender Center (WGC) also held an event in the Keefe Campus Center to assemble gender-affirming care kits that included supplies for individuals after they undergo gender-affirming surgery, such as back scratchers, reusable straws, ginger chews, loofah back brushes, and many more resources. These kits support gender and racial justice, as they allow all individuals of radial and socioeconomic backgrounds to have access to expensive gender-affirming care kits free of charge.

Haley Nicholas, director of gender and LGBTQ+ equity and engagement, gave an informational talk at the beginning of the event to outline the work of the WGC and the Queer Resource Center (QRC) on campus, as well as the event’s goal of mirroring Dr. King’s vision of ensuring that all community members have access to essential resources.

Zoe Hughes ’27 volunteered in Keefe and voiced appreciation for the college. Hughes said she enjoys giving back to the local community,  “but it can be tricky sometimes to get involved with the Amherst area, so it was nice to have this event already planned.”

For members of the campus community that could not actively participate on the Day of Service, there were also opportunities to donate, such as a campus-wide food drive that accepted donations of nut butters and jelly. Donation bins were placed at six locations on campus, including Frost Library and Valentine Dining Hall.

Sarah Barr, Director of Community Engagement, explained that the first iteration of the event, held in 2023, was “offered the day after Martin Luther King Jr. Day, but … in January there aren’t a lot of people around campus.” To allow more students to attend, Barr said, the second iteration of the event was moved to February.

However, before the MLK Day of Service and Action, ODEI held an event celebrating Martin Luther King Jr.’s legacy on Jan. 2, titled The Longest Table. The event was a student-led dinner focused on dialogue between faculty, staff, and students.

Interim Chief Equity and Inclusion Officer Pawan Dhingra expressed that ODEI was “picking up a baton.” Dhingra said that the goal of the event is to bring about a “centering for campus by creating opportunities to give back, internally and externally.”

In being asked about the future of the event, Dhingra mentioned that “the expectation is that this is an annual effort,” even though this was the first time ODEI “has attempted to do an event like this during the school year.” Dhingra added that he thought a service-based event was “a better approach to receive perspectives on all aspects of Dr. King’s work,” rather than “simply bringing speakers in.”

In reflecting on the Day of Service, Jordan Gomez ’25 expressed that she “really admired the idea behind the event, as Martin Luther King Jr. Day is forever a reminder that change doesn't happen without action, and this really inspired me to get out and do something to give back to the community.”

Gomez hopes that this event “sparks further conversation on campus that will inspire future actions and make giving back a greater priority in our lives.”

Linxi Cai ’27 expressed that they have been wanting to “engage with the broader Amherst community since the beginning of [their] sophomore year,” and utilized this event as a “chance to establish [their] connection to nearby volunteering organizations and community in general and make routine efforts in the future to engage with them.”