Legend entertains more than 1,300 people at Show Me Center on Jan 23

John Legend filled the Show Me Center with more than 1,300 students, faculty and community members who were there for the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Celebration Dinner on Jan. 23. The night began with a speech from Legend on education and opportunity and ended with many from the crowd singing along as he performed his award-winning music.

Legend, who is a nine-time Grammy Award winner as well as philanthropist, used these two aspects of his career throughout the night to honor King and to continue what was important to him, Legend said.

Legend said King is one of his top five non-musical influences along with Bill Gates, President Barack Obama, Magic Johnson and teachers and educators who make it a mission to challenge the status quo of education reform.

Legend said many times how important of an opportunity education is and that it is a power that students should not take for granted.

"The more you learn, the more you think about, the more ideas you have about what kind of change you want to see in the world and what kind of change you want to be a part of," Legend said.

Throughout the speech, Legend often addressed college students and reminded them that college is a time to "cultivate your ability to think."

Legend listed many startling statistics about drop-out rates in the United States and said they are a call to action. He said something needs to be done about the broken education system in the United States.

Legend spoke of his organization, called the Show Me Campaign, that is working to fight poverty and the lack of opportunity that children in poverty face. Legend founded Show Me Campaign in 2007 after writing the song "Show Me" in 2006 for his album "Once Again." Legend said that the song is a prayer that addresses the question of why there is so much suffering in the world for people who do not deserve it.

"The more I lived with this song, the more I thought about 'Well what can you do to make the world better, to alleviate some of that suffering,'" Legend said. "If you see people living in extreme poverty, what are you going to do about it, and so I founded our organization around that principle, let's not just talk about it, show me what are you going to do."

Legend said that the Show Me Campaign and his goal is to help end the cycle of poverty by educating the children whose problem is that they have the wrong zip code and to see that they also get to have quality teachers and quality schools. He said without education, doors of opportunity will remain closed.

"When you're poor all kinds of things aren't easy for you, all kinds of things are difficult, all kinds of things are obstacles in the way of you succeeding, particularly one that handicaps so many people living in poverty is that they don't have access to quality education," Legend said.

Southeast Missouri State University freshman and Sigma Sigma Sigma sorority member Margux Bereuter said that she agreed with Legend's stance on the state of education in America.

"It's sad when so much of the drop-out rate is from such a small number of the schools," Bereuter said. "However, my favorite part was definitely singing with Legend at the end with my Sigma sisters."

After Legend spoke, he performed five songs and many students in the crowd sang along to songs that were both hits from his mainstream albums and his album "Wake Up," which was focused on social and political issues. Legend said that his music career and philanthropic career inform and intersect each other and he displayed that on the stage to end the celebration event.

"The more and more I was speaking to young people and getting involved in these issues, the more and more I wanted to do something musically that reflected what I was doing politically and philanthropically," Legend said.