Janni, a sophomore in the College of Arts & Sciences, will be traveling to Atlanta, Ga. and Birmingham, Ala. with 30 other students on a Civil Rights Pilgrimage.,”Megan Janni isn't going home to recuperate from midterms on Wednesday. Instead, she said she wanted to do something meaningful over her fall break.
Janni, a sophomore in the College of Arts & Sciences, will be traveling to Birmingham, Ala., and Atlanta with 30 other Marquette students on a Civil Rights Movement pilgrimage.
"I wanted to find something that would help me grow as a person and experience something I had never experienced before," Janni said.
Pamela Peters, assistant dean for intercultural programs in the Office of Student Development, planned the pilgrimage along with Laura Skaife, assistant dean for community service programs.
The pair applied for and received the Excellence in Diversity Grant from Keenan Grenell, associate provost for diversity, last spring and began planning the trip this fall. They researched historically significant areas near the King Center in Atlanta and decided which of them it was practical to attend in such a short amount of time, Peters said.
The group of 31 students and five chaperones will visit three historically black colleges and universities: Clark Atlanta University, Morehouse College – both in Atlanta – and Miles College in Birmingham, Peters said.
In Atlanta, students will visit the King Center, which was established by Coretta Scott King in 1968 to commemorate Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. The group will also make stops at Ebenezer Baptist Church where King preached, King's childhood home and Coretta Scott King's gravesite, Peters said.
In Birmingham, the pilgrimage will visit the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute and Kelly Ingram Park, where Civil Rights Movement activists gathered and infamously were sprayed with fire hoses, Peters said.
The group will leave Wednesday night and return Sunday evening, Peters said.
She said she is excited about the trip and the diverse people going on the pilgrimage because they will offer very different perspectives on the situation.
"It's always better to see something with your own eyes rather than hearing about it or reading it in a book," Peters said.
Angie Strege, a sophomore in the College of Health Sciences, said she decided to go on the pilgrimage because she grew up in a small town and has never been to the South. She also helped advertise March on Milwaukee events by putting together bulletin boards for residence halls.
Strege said she wants to increase her awareness of diversity and learn more about the Civil Rights Movement.
"I think there's a lot of prejudice still in our nation and Marquette is such an undiverse campus," Strege said. "We're kind of unaware of what is happening."
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