ACTIVITIES ON TAP FOR MARTIN LUTHER KING DAY

Southeast Missouri State University and Cape Girardeau will honor slain civil-rights leader Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. The nation celebrates Dr. Martin Luther King Day Jan. 15.

The university will hold the 11th annual Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Breakfast at 8 a.m. Jan. 15.

Mark Stansbury, interim president of Shelby Community College in Memphis, Tenn., will speak at the breakfast at the Show Me Center. Jetan Robinson-Totton will be guest soloist and Charlene Peyton will be guest pianist.

Tickets for the breakfast are $6 for the general public, $2.75 for Southeast students who don't have a meal plan, and free for students who are paying for campus meals.

Tickets may be purchased at the Southeast Bookstore in the University Center from 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., Monday through Friday. Tickets will be sold through Jan. 12. Tickets won't be sold at the door.

More than 800 people attended last year's breakfast where the featured speaker was law professor Anita Hill. Hill's testimony at the confirmation hearing for Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas almost derailed the nominee.

"It is a time where individuals can come together and reflect and remember, and rededicate their own lives to Dr. King's dream," said Debra Mitchell-Braxton, an assistant director of the Campus Assistance Center.

Dr. Bill Atchley, Southeast president, said: "Dr. King's gentle but forceful reminder that the guiding principle of American society is that one's destiny should be determined by an individual's character and ability, not the color of his or her skin, bears repeating more than a quarter century after his untimely death because there are significant areas in which that message has not yet taken hold."

Stansbury has served as interim president of Shelby State since July 1994.

He was appointed by former mayor Richard Hackett to serve on the committee that selected the city's first director of drug policy.

He served on the strategic planning committee and co-chaired a task force on families and community for Memphis city schools.

For his volunteer efforts, Stansbury has received numerous awards, including the Award of Merit -- the highest honor given to a citizen by the mayor of Memphis.

Stansbury also was recognized by Vice President Al Gore for a photographic exhibition, "Black and White Images."

Stansbury worked briefly as a reporter for the Memphis Commercial Appeal, and had a lengthy public relations career with Holiday Inns Inc.

In addition to the breakfast, the sixth annual Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Community Celebration will be held at 7 p.m. Jan. 15 at Centenary United Methodist Church, 300 N. Ellis. The event is sponsored by the Southeast Missouri Fellowship of Reconciliation and the Cape Girardeau branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People.

Nominations are being sought for the fifth annual Martin Luther King Jr. Award. The award honors a Cape Girardeau area resident who has demonstrated the values of justice, freedom and social betterment.

Letters of nomination should include a brief statement about the individual and the basis for the nomination.

Nominations should be mailed to MLK Award, P.O. Box 417, Cape Girardeau, 63702.

The award presentation will be part of a memorial worship service at 7 p.m. at the church.

The offering from the service will be given in the name of the award recipient to the university's Martin Luther King Jr. Scholarship Fund.

As part of the university's tribute to King, drawings by Cape Girardeau elementary-school students will be displayed in the University Center Program Lounge from 8 a.m. to 10 p.m. Jan. 15-19.

A photographic exhibit will be displayed Jan. 23-25 in the Program Lounge. The exhibit from the Black Archives of MidAmerica in Kansas City chronicles King's life. The exhibit will officially open with a reception at 5:30 p.m. Jan. 23.

Also, on Jan. 23, Jane Elliott will demonstrate a "Blue Eyes, Brown Eyes" discrimination exercise at 6 p.m. in the University Center Ballroom. The exercise, in which participants are labeled inferior or superior based on the color of their eyes, was first held in a third-grade classroom in all-white Riceville, Iowa, following the assassination of King.

Elliott has been a guest on a number of televisions shows, including "The Today Show," "Donahue," and "Oprah Winfrey."

Tickets for Elliott's presentation are $5 for the general public. The presentation is free for students, faculty and staff. Tickets will be sold at the door.

For more information contact the university staff at 651-2273.