Queens College’s Rabbi Moshe Shur isn't just a professor of history but a student of it as well. When he was in college in the 1960s, the Detroit native spent two summers working with Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., helping African-Americans register to vote in the South.
“It was a life changing experience for me,” says Rabbi Shur.
That's why the professor is bringing fourteen students to Georgia and Alabama during the week of Martin Luther King Day. They'll visit historical sites and meet leaders from the Civil Rights Movement. He says their message still rings true today.
"To meet the people who were there to show that people can do things, and that this is a universal calling," he says.
He adds the calling is open to students of all backgrounds. "Queens College is the most diverse college in the United States,” says Shur. “This is the center and we'd like to revive that interest and student activism in civil and human rights around the world."
Nigel Barker, a junior at Queens College, is taking part in the five-day trip for the first time.
“I guess students today, we sort of take for granted the different opportunities we have,” says Barker. “So hopefully, as a result of this trip, I hope to be more proactive and probably help out more and volunteer more.”
Rabbi Shur says the student trip honors Martin Luther King Day as well as Queens College’s historical connection to the Civil Rights Movement.
In 1964, Queens College student Andrew Goodman and two friends were killed by the Ku Klux Klan while working on voter outreach in Mississippi. His legacy still lives on at the campus.
"The clock tower on campus is named after Andrew Goodman," says Shur.
Shur hopes the student trip deepens their understanding of what Goodman and so many other activists fought for. To make sure students continue to learn these stories - the college covers almost all travel expenses.