D-E honored Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. across divisions. During the Lower School (LS) Assembly on Wednesday, students from each LS grade spoke beautifully about how MLK’s dream of racial harmony and equal justice connects to our School’s core values of community, courage, judgment, commitment, respect, and honesty. The Middle School (MS) Assembly took place on Dr. King’s actual birthday, Jan. 15. Ms. Simone Henry Agblonon, Assistant Director of Diversity, Equity, Inclusion & Belonging (LS/MS), engaged MS students in a lively Q&A after a video on the history of MLK Jr. Day that segued into a thoughtful discussion on Dr. King’s legacy. Students also celebrated the occasion with a slice of “birthday cake” on the MS porches. 

Meanwhile, Head of School Dr. Calleroz White spoke during the Upper School Assembly. He shared the fact that his grandfather went to a segregated school and how the many years he spent in Tanzania teaching children living in poverty revealed why we should not take our education for granted. He said his focus of the day was partnership—the answer to “What makes a community come to a place where we can be in one space together?” Dr. CW discussed the iconic March on Washington from a slightly different lens—shining a spotlight on other faith leaders who spoke that day about the fight for social justice, including Rabbi Joachim Prinz, Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel, and Father John LaFarge Jr. He then urged students to take our mission to heart and “look at this world as something you can make better.” Dr. CW concluded with words of the late statesman and civil rights leader John Lewis, whom he’d had the opportunity to meet: “When you see something that is not right, not fair, not just, you must have the courage to stand up, to speak up, and find a way to get in the way.”