BELLINGHAM — Community members from across Whatcom County filled Sehome High School on Monday, Jan. 19, for an annual Martin Luther King Jr. Day celebration centered on the theme “Mission Possible: Moving, Building, Uniting.” The free event brought together K–12 students, college students and local residents for a morning of reflection, performance and service.
Hosted by the Community Consortium for Cultural Recognition (C3R), the celebration ran from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. and featured a community breakfast, speakers, music and student-led presentations before shifting into service projects. The consortium partners with Western Washington University (WWU), local school districts and community organizations each year to coordinate programming, volunteers and outreach.
Attendees were encouraged to bring unopened, non-perishable food and hygiene products to support campus food pantries at WWU, Whatcom Community College (WCC), Bellingham Technical College (BTC), and Northwest Indian College (NWIC).
“The drive was designed to connect King’s legacy of service with present-day concerns about student basic needs,” said festival attendee and WWU student Camren Beacher. “When people line up to donate food or sign up for a project, you realize ‘moving, building, uniting’ isn’t just a tagline. It’s what happens when people actually show up for each other in spaces like this.”
Throughout the morning, speakers and performers linked King’s message to current issues such as housing, racial justice and polarization in local and national politics. Student presentations and spoken word pieces emphasized that “moving, building, uniting” requires everyday action, not only an annual observance.
Beacher said attending the event helped connect classroom discussions to community work: “In my classes we talk about systems and policy all the time, but being here makes it feel local and urgent. Seeing high school students, college students and elders in the same room reminds me that Dr. King’s dream is about generations working together, not just remembering a speech once a year.”
WWU student Adam Moore attended with friends from a campus club and said the day reframed the holiday for him.
“I used to see this as just a long weekend, but hearing local speakers talk about housing, racism and voting in Bellingham made it clear that we have our own work to do here,” Moore said. “It pushed me to ask what it really means to be an ally on my campus, not just repost quotes online.”
Moore said the multigenerational crowd stood out: “There were kids running around, elders who’ve been doing this work for decades and students like me all listening to the same message. If we can keep that same energy after today—on campus, in city meetings, in everyday conversations—then days like this really can move us toward the kind of justice Dr. King was fighting for.”
As the crowd filtered out of the Sehome High School gym and into the gray January afternoon, the message of the day lingered longer than the program itself. The event did more than honor a historic figure; it asked students and neighbors to see themselves as part of an unfinished movement toward justice. From food donations to service sign-ups, each small action pointed back to the idea that King’s legacy lives in what people choose to do next, not just what they choose to remember.
