Sutton Challenges Students: ‘The Worst Regret You Can Have Is to Not Try’
Huntsville Superintendent Inspires Audience with MLK Day Keynote
Christin Watson
Students were captivated Tuesday as Dr. Clarence Sutton, Superintendent of Huntsville City Schools, delivered an inspiring keynote at AAMU’s Annual MLK Day Celebration.
Sutton, a trailblazer in education from Tuscaloosa, Alabama, shared his personal connection to Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s legacy and emphasized the ongoing relevance of King’s vision for equality and service.
“My dad was in Montgomery during the Civil Rights Movement,” Sutton reflected. “He marched from Selma to Montgomery. It pains me that even in 2025, we still have to call out names like Michael Brown, Eric Garner, Breonna Taylor and George Floyd.”
Highlighting persistent racial disparities, Sutton addressed challenges that demand collective action. “The median income for Black households is $56,000 compared to $90,000 for White households. Homeownership among Black Americans is just 40%, while it’s 73% for White Americans. These inequities shouldn’t exist in a nation built on equality.”
As the first Black male superintendent of Huntsville City Schools, Sutton shared his own journey of overcoming barriers. “When I walked into Huntsville City Schools, they had a wall of all the former superintendents. There wasn’t one person who looked like me. We had a Black female I had to research to find out she was a superintendent. Picture wasn’t even on the wall! So when the job opened and I was encouraged to apply, my first thought was, ‘Why? No one like me has ever done this before.’ A friend reminded me, ‘If you don’t try, you’ve already talked yourself out of your destiny.’”
He urged students to embrace three principles to keep Dr. King’s dream alive:
- Be Prepared to Fight – “If you want to be excellent, you are going to have some adversity. And if you fall at the first sign of adversity, you’ll never be great.”
- Be Excellent Every Day – “There are no days off. There are no days you can be average. Average people will not change and impact the world.”
- Be Prepared to Be Different – “You’re gifted and you’re beautiful. Every time you look in the mirror say, ‘I’m a bad mama-jama,’ ‘I’m a bad shut your mouth,’ because you start your movement by encouraging yourself. When you’re confident in who you are, no one can talk you out of who you can be.”
Sutton also challenged students to act now to make a difference in their communities. “Dr. King believed that intelligence plus character is the true goal of education,” he explained. “My question to you is, ‘How are you maximizing your opportunity here?’ Every transcript, every resume, every action matters.”
Sutton closed with a powerful reminder: “Our communities depend on education. Without it, we lack the foundation for hospitals, police officers, and financial institutions. As I look around this room, there’s a bright future for Black America right here, starting in Huntsville, Alabama. You say ‘Start Here and Go Anywhere.’ My question is will you start here?”
The AAMU Gospel Choir performed to open the MLK Day Celebration and closed the event by asking the audience to sing along during its beautiful rendition of “Lift Every Voice and Sing.”