This Friday, Oct. 9 at 6:40 a.m., UNI student-athletes in cooperation with Minority Student-Athlete Leadership Team (MSALT) and the Student-Athlete Advisory Committee (SAAC) will be holding a peaceful march in protest to racism and police brutality. The march, referred to as a “UNIty walk,” will hold the theme of We Rise As One and will commence at exactly at 7:17 a.m. at sunrise on Friday. The event is scheduled to begin at the south side of the McLeod Center and will conclude at the campanile at the center of UNI’s campus. It was planned by UNI student-athletes in cooperation with the UNI Athletics Department.

While the event will be held by UNI student-athletes, it will be open to anyone who would like to peacefully march in protest of social injustice. Event participants are expected to wear face coverings and to properly social distance throughout the course of the event.

UNI student-athletes from all across the athletics realm have been eager to speak up against injustice and to protest alongside their teammates and the greater campus community. Multiple student-athletes spoke about the event in a press release through UNI Athletics.

“We are out there fighting together on the field, going to battle with these guys every day in practice,” said UNI senior linebacker Alfonzo Lambert. “It is a big thing to me that my teammates will stand next to me off of the field, too. The relationships you make are lifelong friendships. They are deeper than football.”

“We are tired of what is going on,” UNI men’s basketball junior Austin Phyfe said. “We’ve been doing all we can to educate ourselves and work through that part of the process, but we are at a point we can’t sit back any longer. We want to go out into the community, do something to make a change and let everyone know that the student-athletes at UNI care about what is happening, and we want to do something to make a change.”

The UNIty march comes in response to growing unrest in the country regarding social injustice and police brutality. UNI student-athletes are not the only athletes using their platform to protest, as many players, coaches and organizations from college to the pros have been protesting in the year 2020.