Realizing the Dream 2025 Events and Activities Announced

BET gospel singing competition winner to headline annual concert

This story was updated to correctly identify award recipients. Vera Jenkins Booker is the Mountaintop Award recipient and Dr. William Chace is the Call to Conscience recipient.

TUSCALOOSA, Ala. — “Realizing the Dream Through Struggle and Change” is the theme of the annual Realizing the Dream events taking place Jan. 17-20 to celebrate the life and legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

Each year’s theme is selected by a committee that includes representatives from Shelton State Community College, Stillman College, the Tuscaloosa chapter of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference and The University of Alabama.

Legacy Awards Banquet

On Friday, Jan. 17, at 6:30 p.m., the 16th Legacy Awards Banquet will take place in Sellers Auditorium at the Bryant Conference Center on the UA campus. Award-winning broadcast journalist Judy Woodruff will be the Legacy Awards Banquet speaker. Best known as the chief Washington correspondent for the “MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour,” Woodruff went on to work at CNN, where she served as anchor and senior correspondent for 12 years before returning to PBS in 2007. A Duke University graduate, she is the recipient of an Emmy Lifetime Achievement Award, the Radcliffe Medal, Poynter Medal for Lifetime Achievement in Journalism, Gwen Ifill Press Freedom Award and Cronkite Award for Excellence in Journalism.

At the banquet, nurse Vera Jenkins Booker will receive the Mountaintop Award. In 1965, while serving as a third-shift supervisor at Good Samaritan Hospital in Selma, she tended to civil rights activist Jimmy Lee Jackson after he was shot in Marion. She played an active role in organizing nurses to join demonstrations at the Dallas County Courthouse to advocate for voting rights, and in June 2006 she testified before a Perry County grand jury, which indicted the man responsible for Jackson’s murder.

Dr. William M. Chace, a professor of English and president emeritus of Emory University, will receive the Call to Conscience Award. Chace served on the faculty at Stillman College during the 1963-1964 academic year as part of the Wilson Fellows program, which funded educators to take teaching positions in the South. Against the advice of the college administration, he openly supported students’ efforts toward equality and social justice.

Samad Gillani, Student Government Association president at UA, will receive the Horizon Award for his visionary servant leadership and his ongoing commitment to pursue positive and necessary change that benefits us all.

Realizing the Dream Concert

Gospel singer-songwriter Le’Andria Johnson will be the featured artist for the 2025 Realizing the Dream Concert on Sunday, Jan. 19. The concert will begin at 7:30 p.m. at UA’s Moody Music Concert Hall.

Johnson won season three of “Sunday Best,” the BET gospel singing competition show. In 2011, she received her first GRAMMY® Award for Best Gospel/Contemporary Christian Music Performance for her debut single, “Jesus.” An NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Gospel Album followed in 2012, and in 2013, she received two Stellar Awards for Best New Artist and Best Contemporary Female Vocalist.

Unity Day

Realizing the Dream partner Tuscaloosa SCLC will sponsor Unity Day activities on Monday, Jan. 20. The day will begin with a Unity Day Breakfast at Beulah Baptist Church at 8 a.m. A Unity March from the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Elementary School to Tuscaloosa City Hall is scheduled to begin at noon. The Mass Rally honoring the life, legacy and retirement of civil rights advocate Dr. Charles Steele Jr. will begin at 5 p.m. at First African Baptist Church.

Additional Realizing the Dream events will take place throughout the year.

Tickets

Concert tickets are $20. Legacy Banquet tickets are $30 for individuals or $200 for a table of eight. Dress is semi-formal. Tickets for both events will be available for purchase online beginning Friday, Jan. 10, at 8 a.m.

Purchase banquet tickets and concert tickets online.

For ticketing information, call 205-348-7111 or email community.affairs@ua.edu. Visit the Realizing the Dream website or call 205-348-8376 for more information.