ATLANTA - Congressman John Lewis will speak at Oglethorpe University on April 11 at 7:30 p.m. in Lupton Auditorium. Lewis, who urges students to find their passion and make their voice heard, will discuss current issues in civil rights.

Lewis, representative of Georgia’s Fifth Congressional District, is a prominent civil rights leader and social activist. Although as a child he was often told “Don’t get in trouble and don’t get in the way,” Lewis works to protect human rights and civil liberties to build a “Beloved Community” in America. When he moved to Atlanta in 1963, he became chairman of the national Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, a position he held until 1966. In 1991 Lewis became the first lifetime achievement recipient of the John F. Kennedy "Profile in Courage Award.”

Lewis submitted legislation, passed by the House in 2003, which laid the foundation for the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of African American History and Culture, to be built on the National Mall in Washington, D.C.

The April 11 event, free and open to the public, is sponsored by Oglethorpe’s Safe Zone, the Rich Foundation Urban Leadership Program, Ujamaa, Student Progressive Activist Network and the Women and Gender Studies Department.