The Columbus Human Rights Commission has announced that its annual meeting has been scheduled for May 11th at the Commons. The HRC says that the 2017 William R. Laws Human Rights Award recipient, Larry Perkinson, will be honored at the dinner. The Commission selected Perkinson, Student Services Director for the Bartholomew County Consolidated School Corporation, at its meeting on March 29. Commissioners say they selected Perkinson for “his commitment to the community and his advocacy of all students.” This marks another recent accolade for Perkinson, who was inducted into the BCSC Education Hall of Fame last year.

Sheila Suess Kennedy, a professor of law and public policy at the School of Public and Environmental Affairs at Indiana University Purdue University Indianapolis, will address the gathering. The HRC says that Kennedy’s academic fields of expertise include constitutional culture, charitable choice, civil liberties and civil rights, religion and public policy, nonprofit organizations, and media and public policy. She is a former Republican candidate for the 11th Congressional District, former executive director of the Indiana Civil Liberties Union, faculty fellow with both the Center for Religion and American Culture and the Tobias Center for Leadership Excellence, and the founder of the Center for Civic Literacy at IUPUI. Kennedy is slated to talk about civic literacy.

The HRC says that the winners of the 2017 Benjamin M. King Essay and the J. Irwin Miller Art Contests will also be honored at the dinner. The theme for this year’s art and essay contests is “Advocating for Others.” Those winners are expected to be announced soon.

The Human Rights Commission says that tickets for the dinner are $30 and must be purchased in advance. Ticket sales will begin on Wednesday, April 12 and can be purchased at the Human Rights Commission office inside of City Hall. Tickets can also be purchased online at www.columbus.in.gov/human-rights/. The deadline for purchasing tickets is 5 p.m. on May 5.