MLK Day A Day Of Service In Central Illinois

Martin Luther King Junior once said that “Life’s most persistent and urgent question is, ‘What are you doing for others?’”.  And Martin Luther King Junior Day (January 18) has become a “Day of Service” for many across the country.

Student Service Activities at U of I, EIU

At the University of Illinois Urbana campus, students will be kicking off the spring semester Monday afternoon at 12:30 PM with service activities at the Illini Union Ballroom and several locations off campus. The activities range from food packaging with Illini Fighting Hunger to installing smoke detectors with the Red Cross.

At Eastern Illinois in Charleston, the service activities begin at 12:00 PM in the ballroom of the Martin Luther King Junior University Union. Crystal Brown with EIU’s Office of Civil Engagement and Volunteerism says they usually attract 150 to 200 students.

“Our focus is on creating herb kits for our local community members that we’ll be giving out at the food pantries,” said Brown. “And then, putting food supply kits and goodie bags for the 300 children in our After-School programs together.”

Most participants sign up in advance for both the U of I and EIU Day of Service events, but walk-ins are welcome.

Champaign County Historical Museum

At the Champaign County Historical Museum in downtown Champaign, Board President T-J Blakeman says they’re looking for volunteers to help them prepare the museum for renovations.

“We have a basement underneath the museum, and it needs to be cleaned out, so we can get some of the things in the museum into the basement,” said Blakeman. “We have a research room and a library in the upstairs that we’re going to be taking apart, moving some shelves, re-shelving some books. And then we have a number of exhibits that we still need to pack up, put into archival boxes, and put into storage.”

The Champaign County Historical Museum is located at University and 1st in Champaign. Service activities begin at 9 AM and continue throughout the day.

Books To Prisoners

Elsewhere, the Books To Prisoners program needs volunteers to process book requests. They'll be reading letters from inmates, selecting books from the Books To Prisoners collection to meet their requests and packaging the books for shipping.

That’s Monday afternoon from 1:00 to 3:00 PM at the Independent Media Center in the basement of the old Post Office building in downtown Urbana.

Decatur Activities

In Decatur, Martin Luther King Day of Service activities include a Food Drive at the County Market on West Grand Avenue from 9 to 5. You can drop off donations for the Northeast Community Fund with members of the Millikin University men’s basketball team, who will be staffing the drive.

And all this week, Dove Incorporated is accepting donations of small-sized personal items like mini-Kleenex packets, hand sanitizers, lip balm and mini-flashlights. The items will be distributed to the homeless during the upcoming Macon County Point In Time homeless census, and to DeWitt County children through a school backpack program. Donations are welcome at the Dove Inc. offices at 302 S. Union in Decatur and 803 W. Leander in Clinton. On Martin Luther King Jr. Day, when the offices are closed, donations can made dropped off at the Domestic Violence Shelter in Decatur.

More information about Martin Luther King Jr. Day of Service activities can be found at the state of Illinois’ Serve.Illinois.gov website.