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Athens celebrates its international population at the second Global Education Fair

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THE PLAINS, Ohio (WOUB/Report for America) — Athens residents got a chance to tour the world without leaving town at the second annual Global Education Fair in the Athens High School cafeteria Thursday evening.

The event included tables representing 20 countries, each run by a mix of international and American Ohio University students and staff. Presenters shared facts, signed “passports” and offered visitors popular snacks from their respective countries. Kids who visited at least 10 tables also received a certificate of global education to take home with them.

Tetyana Dovbnya signs a pretend passport for children visiting the Ukraine table at the Global Education Fair.
Tetyana Dovbnya signs a “passport” for children visiting the Ukraine table at the Global Education Fair. [Theo Peck-Suzuki | WOUB Public Media]
Cat Cutcher, associate director of OU’s Center for International Studies, said the goal of the event was to help people in Athens connect more strongly with their neighbors from abroad.

“I hear from a lot of teachers that the children in the schools, they don’t get many opportunities to learn directly about the world from international folks, because the schools are not very diverse here,” Cutcher said. “And so we are trying to connect the great resources of international students at Ohio University to the Athens City School District.”

Pittaya Paladroi-Shane returns a pretend passport to a child visiting the Thailand table.
Pittaya Paladroi-Shane returns a pretend passport to a child visiting the Thailand table. [Theo Peck-Suzuki | WOUB Public Media]
The idea for the fair came together in response to the anti-Asian hate that swept through the U.S. during the COVID-19 pandemic. A local group, AAPI-LEAD, rose to meet the challenge.

“We wanted to show the community what we have done and what we have contributed,” said AAPI-LEAD’s Yuqiu You.

The group didn’t want to focus exclusively on Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders, however.

“International students, they feel isolated from the community. So that’s why we think we should bring them to the community,” said You’s colleague Yuchun Zhou.

Visitors get food from local restaurants at the Global Education Fair.
Local restaurants provided food for the event. [Theo Peck-Suzuki | WOUB Public Media]
Thus the Global Education Fair was born.

Cutcher said she’s already thinking about how to make next year’s fair even better. She also expressed a desire to work with more school districts outside Athens.

“We’d love opportunities to visit schools,” she said. “So if teachers or parents have groups of kids or classrooms that they would like us to come visit, we’d be happy to accommodate that.”