Many of us take a day off from work or classes on the third Monday in January to honor the life and legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., but have you also considered taking a day on to serve your community? This day has been designated a U.S. federal holiday since 1983, and since 1994 it has also been designated a national day of service.

The MLK Day of Service provides an opportunity for all Americans to help bring Dr. King’s vision of a “Beloved Community” a little closer to reality by engaging in action that helps solve social problems, working against the triple evils of poverty, racism, and militarism to create a society where all people can share in the wealth of the earth, and conflicts are resolved peacefully through a mutual commitment to King’s principles, philosophy, and techniques of nonviolence.

How You Can Be Involved

• Visit the Martin Luther King, Jr. Day of Service pages sponsored by The King Center, Youth Service America, and The Mission Continues to learn what service opportunities are available in your community and how you can participate.
• The City of Denton will be honoring Dr. King’s legacy with a Community March and Celebration on the theme “Mentoring the Dream.” Set up for the march will begin at American Legion Hall Senior Center in Fred Moore Park at 9:00 a.m. The march will start at 9:30 a.m. and end up at the Martin Luther King Recreation Center, where there will be a program at 10:00 a.m. immediately following the march.  
• The communities of North Texas will come together in a virtual, nonpolitical, interfaith civic event on January 19th at 6:00 p.m. in the Marcus High School Arena in Flower Mound, Texas. The theme for 2026 is “Better Together: Making the Dream a Reality.” Join this event to celebrate the ideals of Dr. King such as elimination of all forms of prejudice, equality of races, equality of gender, sustainable development, and international peace.
• The Martin Luther King, Jr. Community Center in Dallas will be sponsoring an MLK Day Parade on Monday to kick off an entire week of events highlighting issues of opportunity, diversity, and community. The theme for this year’s MLK Celebration Week is “Remaining Awake Through a Great Transformation.”

Learn More About Martin Luther King, Jr.

More information about Dr. King and his philosophy can be found at The King Center for Nonviolent Social Change. Shortly after Dr. King’s assassination, his widow Coretta Scott King established this nongovernmental, nonprofit organization to provide research, education, and training in King’s principles, philosophy, and techniques of nonviolence. The Center champions the causes of freedom, justice, and equality by working to eliminate poverty, build community, and foster peace. 

Other resources, including a large collection of online documents, are available at Stanford University’s Martin Luther King, Jr. Research and Education Institute.

“The Fifteen-Year Battle for Martin Luther King Jr. Day” is a detailed account of how this federal holiday came to be, provided by the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History & Culture.

Other Ways You Can Make a Difference

Service to your community doesn’t have to be limited to one day a year! Learn more about ways you can become active in your national, state, and local community at the UNT Libraries Civic Engagement Portal.

Let’s each take some time on this special day to make a contribution to our community, keeping in mind these immortal words of Dr. King:

“Every man must decide whether he will walk in the light of creative altruism or the darkness of destructive selfishness. Life’s most persistent and urgent question is what are you doing for others?”

Source of image at top of page: Highsmith, Carol M, photographer. Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial, Washington, D.C. United States Washington D.C. Washington D.C. District of Columbia, 2011. November. Photograph. https://www.loc.gov/item/2013650720/.

Article by Bobby Griffith