2026-2027 Contest Theme

Building the Beloved Community: Every Voice. Every Heart. Every Hand.

“The aftermath of nonviolence is the creation of the beloved community. The aftermath of nonviolence is redemption. The aftermath of nonviolence is reconciliation. The aftermath of violence are emptiness and bitterness. This is the thing I’m concerned about. Let us fight passionately and unrelentingly for the goals of justice and peace. But let’s be sure that our hands are clean in this struggle. Let us never fight with falsehood and violence and hate and malice, but always fight with love, so that when the day comes that the walls of segregation have completely crumbled in Montgomery, that we will be able to live with people as their brothers and sisters.”

Source & Grounding Quote: “The Birth of a New Nation,” Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., 1957.

Additional information can be found here: 26 27 MLK Educational contest series