Central Students Organize to Bring Back International Festival Comment

On March 21 from 6:00 p.m.- 9:00 p.m., Central Senior Class Officers & Interact Club will be hosting the 2024 CCHS International Festival at Central High School. This is an event where community members can come and learn about different cultures, meet new people, and enjoy cultural performances and food. Profits will be directly given to The Refugee Center here in Champaign.  

Before COVID-19, International Festival was something regularly put on by Central. However, after the lockdown of 2020, it did not continue, as people focused on restarting other events like prom and homecoming.  Senior class president Angela Nguyen said, “There hasn’t been a concrete event to share and celebrate all the cultures at our school.” Another senior, Ellie Kim, and her decided it would be important to fight for an event like this to come back. 

There will be multiple booths. Most of them will be run by student groups or individual students from both Centennial and Central, but other organizations from around the community will contribute as well. Each booth will have performances, foods, presentations, and activities. This is in hope that anyone interested in the community can come and support. 

One of the goals of this event is to celebrate cultures and provide a learning opportunity for the community. Kim said, “We have so many students from different cultures that aren’t as celebrated as we want.” This will be an opportunity for students to share these parts of themselves to not only the school but the community. 

Keerthi Jagarlamudi, one of the Interact Club officers who helped with the event, said, “People don’t usually see the side of me that is affected by Indian culture.” She thinks that other students should be able to see her culture, a part of her that is so important, and also teach her about theirs. 

The hope is to continue this event for many years to come. Junior class officers and junior Interact Club officers are already helping with this event in order for them to easily work on it next year. 

Nguyen said, “We worked to make this event not only really special but also accessible financially.” Presale tickets are sold from March 18 – 21 for $8 a ticket. Tickets sold at the door are $10 for each adult and $6 for each kid. Another option for payment is bringing in five cans of food. All of the leaders made it clear that their goal is for “anyone and everyone” to come and learn about the experiences and cultures we have in Champaign.