Meridian Announces the Martin Luther King Day of Service – January 18-21, 2013

The International Day of Service took place over the weekend of January 18 – January 21, 2013. This Global Service Leaders Initiative honored Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and the 50th anniversary of Dr. King’s famous ʺI Have a Dreamʺ speech.

Traditionally, MLK Day is one of the largest volunteer days in the United States. However, the GSL team believes that the legacy and values of MLK translate beyond U.S. borders. As a result, the team organized an international campaign to perform service in communities throughout the world. This campaign honored the legacy of Dr. King and the values he upheld.

GSL members were invited and encouraged to participate in self-organized projects within their own communities to honor Dr. King. Projects were open to interpretation and could be related to any community challenge. The only overarching guideline was that projects must respond to the prompt “I Have a Dream that through service we can...”, inspired by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s “I Have a Dream” speech.

One aspect included the 2013 DC Knit-In and clothing drive, which was a family-friendly service event in which community members joined together for an afternoon of knitting, crocheting, cultural enrichment and warming refreshments - all to benefit local homeless shelters.