Flathead High School, in collaboration with the Crown of the Continent Choir, Flathead Folk Band, and International Baccalaureate English and music students, will honor the legacy of Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. through a community celebration featuring music and speeches. 

The public is invited to attend the Martin Luther King Jr. Day Community Celebration at 5 p.m. Monday in the high school auditorium, 644 Fourth Ave. W. in Kalispell. There is no cost to attend. 

The event aims to foster an understanding of King’s legacy through speeches, music and videos, underscoring his enduring influence on non-violent social justice movements. The program will feature a selection of songs and anthems from the Civil Rights era.  

On Wednesday, International Baccalaureate English teachers Alison Kreiss and Clayton Mauritzen along with senior International Baccalaureate students Kylie Anderson, Gracyne Johnson and Jacob Johnson reflected on King’s impact as a pivotal leader in the civil rights movement. They emphasized his role in abolishing racial segregation, discrimination and voter suppression through nonviolent protests and marches. 

The students highlighted the importance of educating others about King’s contributions, which extended beyond racial equality to address issues like poverty and homelessness, Anderson said. They noted the relevance of his teachings to contemporary movements like Black Lives Matter. 

“It’s really neat to see how his ideas and his actions are still prevalent,” Jacob Johnson said, later adding, “It’s incredible to see how far we’ve gotten and how far we still need to go.” 

Participating in last year’s celebration provided the students with a new perspective on the significance of Martin Luther King Jr. Day. 

“It’s a good thing to have because people may learn about it in schools, but they don’t realize the impact it had on a lot of people’s lives and how changed it would be now if we didn’t have people like King,” Gracyne Johnson said. “I think it’s just one of those really important events that is needed for adults and it’s needed for kids.”  

As part of their International Baccalaureate English course, students study a variety of King's speeches, sermons, and essays. 

“Most schools probably only teach ‘I Have a Dream’ and maybe ‘Letter from Birmingham Jail’ … We read over 10 speeches, sermons and essays over the course of the second quarter. We really look at the scope and evolution of King’s thoughts over his entire career,” Kreiss said. 

Mauritzen praised King’s rhetorical mastery. 

“I just love teaching him. I think he's really insightful. I think he's really thoughtful, and I think he gives a lot of space for people who don't agree with him, to join him and not feel challenged, but also be cared for and loved,” Mauritzen said. “That's just such an important part of his entire kind of mission. He also understands the world, I think, in a really profound way that I still keep learning from every time I teach it,”  

The students acknowledged ongoing challenges in race relations. 

“I mean, I see it even at school, people will say racial slurs in the hallway thinking it’s funny. And these are students that don’t understand the gravity of what these people had to go through,” Gracyne Johnson said, adding that even though Kalispell doesn’t have a large Black population, these issues still matter and impact the Black community that does live here. 

Mauritzen gave historical context to King’s work, emphasizing its continuity with earlier struggles for equality. 

“Black Americans have been part of the country since the 1600s. I think of part of this movement, the Civil Rights era, as a continuation of what happened in, you know, in the 1770s and ’80s. I think of it as a continuation of what happened following the Civil War and the Reconstruction,” Mauritzen said. “I would happily put King among any of the Founding Fathers. 

“I think, like all the other movements, one of the things that's always a challenge is that he's just one name among of a lot … There's a lot of people that we just don't remember who are part of this. For me, that's what I want to honor. Not just his legacy, but the legacy of everybody we are still impacted by — the choices they made and the work they did.” 

Hilary Matheson may be reached at 758-4431 or hmatheson@dailyinterlake.com.