The annual Martin Luther King Jr. Birthday Celebration at Georgia Perimeter College has expanded beyond the Jan. 15 inspirational program featuring a nationally known celebrity.

This year, that 7 p.m. program will kick off the college’s MLK Jr. Week of Service honoring the legacy of civil rights icon and Atlanta native the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.

A day of community engagement takes place on Jan. 18 from 10:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m.

Students, faculty and staff will volunteer with eight community projects that run the gamut from sprucing up Bethune Elementary School in Decatur with artwork and landscaping to trail maintenance at the Dunwoody Nature Center.

GPC volunteers also will help Open Hand deliver meals to homebound seniors and individuals living with HIV/AIDS and other chronic and terminal illnesses in Clarkston, and they will mulch and edge the newly constructed flower bed at the intersection of I-20 and U.S. Highway 278 in Covington.

The college’s MLK Jr. Birthday Celebration, in its 14th year, honors King’s legacy by promoting diversity and tolerance and encouraging others, especially youth, to pursue King’s dream of equality.

The Jan. 15 event at Beulah Baptist Church in Decatur will feature former Poet Laureate Rita Dove, a tribute to the late Duke Ellington by the DeKalb Symphony Orchestra, and a performance by Atlanta’s International Youth Chorus, Harmony.

As part of the program, GPC has asked elementary, middle and high school teachers to discuss with their students Dove’s poem “The First Book” – “Open it/Go ahead, it won’t bite./Well maybe a little. More a nip like/A tingle. It’s pleasurable, really. You see it keeps on opening. You may fall in…Dig in/You will never reach bottom.”

Artistic representation of the poem will be juried and displayed during the MLK Jr. Birthday Celebration at Beulah Baptist Church.

In addition, GPC students have the opportunity to participate in a poetry and art contest based on Dove’s “Banneker” poem. They can write an original poem or submit a painting or drawing with a paragraph explaining how the poem inspired the entry.

Winners will be honored with cash prizes and recognized during the celebration. Georgia Perimeter faculty members also are working with the GPC Center for Civic Engagement and Service Learning to expand classroom awareness of Dove’s writing and to encourage student participation in all the MLK events.

Beulah Missionary Baptist Church is at 2340 Clifton Springs Road. For more information, visit www.gpc.edu/mlk.