Martin Luther King Jr. Day of Service
On Monday, January 20, 2025, the Friends School of Baltimore community, including students, families, faculty, and alumni, will unite for the 21st annual MLK Day of Service. We are excited to offer 15 diverse activities, both asynchronous and synchronous, virtual, on-campus, and off-campus. These activities will benefit various nonprofits, including Paul’s Place, Family Connections/Promise Heights, Student Support Network, Our Daily Bread, the Maryland Book Bank, Baltimore Hunger Project, Broadmead, Believe in Tomorrow Children’s House, My Sister’s Place, Share Baby, Art with a Heart, Weekend Backpacks, and the Baltimore SPCA.
Each MLK Day of Service begins with a breakfast program in the Friends School Dining Hall to get volunteers nourished and centered. This year we welcome two former Friends School students to be our keynote speakers. Brothers Ali and Atman Smith, co-founders of The Holistic Life Foundation and Friends School parents. Both Smith brothers started their FSB journey before pre-school! Ali graduated from Friends School in 1994, while Atman graduated from Dunbar High School. Both went on to attend and graduate from the University of Maryland. In 2001, they founded the Holistic Life Foundation along with their college friend, Andres Gonzalez.
The Holistic Life Foundation, a nonprofit led by BIPOC in Baltimore, Maryland, commits to improving the social, educational, emotional, and environmental well-being of underserved communities. They offer yoga, mindfulness, and health initiatives to strengthen individuals and families, highlighting the crucial link between human beings and their environment.
The Holistic Life Foundation has reached over 200,000 students and adults across more than 100 schools and communities throughout the nation, offering upwards of 50,000 hours of training. Currently, they provide services to over 5,000 students in Baltimore City Public Schools each week, with the goal of enhancing social, educational, and emotional well-being through yoga, mindfulness, and wellness programs.
In 2022, the trio published a book entitled “Let Your Light Shine: How Mindfulness Can Empower Children and Rebuild Communities”. In 2024, Baltimore Magazine named Atman, Ali and Andres "GameChangers." Their work has been featured on the Discovery Channel ‘Why We Hate’, Good Morning America, NBC Nightly News, CNN, and CBS, as well as in O, The Oprah Magazine, The Washington Post, Upworthy, Mindful Magazine, and many other publications.
We are thrilled to maintain our commitment to collaborative work within the Baltimore communities, in alignment with the national mission of the Martin Luther King, Jr. holiday. This mission seeks to empower individuals, fortify communities, overcome barriers, devise solutions to social issues, and advance us towards Dr. King's ideal of a "Beloved Community." We have volunteer spots available in a variety of creative activities and are confident that they will all fill up as they have in past years.
“We must use time creatively in the knowledge that the time is always right to do right.”
“Life’s most persistent and urgent question is, ‘What are you doing for others?’”
-Martin Luther King Jr