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The World Leaders Gallery was born in 2004 as a part of the 10th Anniversary of the United We Walk Celebration. Our student organization, S.H.A.R.E (Students Helping Accepting Reaching Ethnicity), wanted to create a forum in which students could recognize those leaders who had devoted their lives to the causes of protecting freedom, fighting for justice, and working toward peace. The gallery features 8 X 10 portraits of each of the selected leaders and was unveiled in January 2004 as a part of the candlelight vigil. Our goal was to add another leader each year in order to grow the gallery and enhance its effect. Selecting the first group of gallery members was extremely rewarding. Each student drew on his or her own cultural background to identify world leaders that should be featured. Those selected in the first year represented a diverse group of individuals who embodied the ideals that that the gallery was designed to highlight. Among them were Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Mahatma Gandhi, Mother Theresa, and President Lyndon B. Johnson. The gallery serves as a living testament to the importance of diversity and the contributions and sacrifices that great leaders have made internationally in the ongoing fight for justice and peace. It is very gratifying to see that this important gallery will remain open year after year and that students will continue to elect additional members as a part of the United We Walk Celebration. At this defining moment in our country’s history, it is crucial that we continue to identify and recognize those individuals who have set a positive example so that we can learn from them and become the kind of leaders that will work toward positive social change. Michael Rubyan, Past Student Co-Chair, University of Michigan Senior, Pre-Med Studies, January 2009 Eighteen World Leaders in the cause of Unity and Peace are honored, the eighteen honorees include: Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States Supreme Court Justice, Thurgood Marshall Mahandas K. Gandhi Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Lyndon Baines Johnson, President of the United States Mother Theresa Father William Cunningham, founder of Operation Hope, Detroit Jimmy Carter, President of the United States, Menachem Begin, Prime Minister of Israel and Anwar el-Sadat, President of Egypt The 14th Dalai Lama Nelson Mandela, President of South Africa Representative Shirley Chisholm Rosa Parks Coretta Scott King Paul Rusesabagina Oprah Winfrey Barack Obama, President of the United States Alice Paul, Women's Rights Activist   The 20th honoree will be announced at the 2011 Candlelight Vigil. |
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