By Bryan Simo, Staff Writer
River Hill’s HillFest is coming sooner this year with some new changes. HillFest is a celebratory showcase of RHHS’s exciting and diverse student community that features displays from many of the school’s clubs and organizations, performances and food.
This year, HillFest will be co-hosted by the PTSA and the River Hill Diversity Association and will take place in early March rather than April, as in previous years. The RHDA’s mission is to celebrate differences, spread diversity and promote acceptance, which they hope to do with this year’s HillFest.
Unlike Hawk Flock, a similar showcase of the school’s clubs and organizations, HillFest is hosted indoors and is a more community-based event that allows the entire student community to participate. According to senior Daniel Murakami, the best part of HillFest is “interacting with new people and seeing many… peers leading all the games, booths and performances.”
As secretary of the National Art Honor Society and president of the Blue Room Breakers, Daniel is excited to see how this year will fare since he believes, “HillFest gives a wonderful opportunity to expose how inclusive our community is.” Last year, the Blue Room Breakers set up a booth by the front entrance where they offered to teach people various breakdance moves along with doing some street style performances that garnered a sizable crowd. This year, Daniel plans to “do the same thing,” but take it a step further with “a performance on the auditorium stage.”
Senior Sarah Chin, co-president of Project Lotus, a club supporting Asian American and Pacific Islander students, says “[they] weren’t able to do [HillFest] last year, but hopefully [they] can this year.” Another school organization, Alpha Achievers, an African American based multicultural club, also hopes to participate this year, according to club liaison, senior Michael Amadieagwu. “Last year was a big success so we’ll probably be there again this year,” he said.
The student community has many ways to participate in HillFest. Clubs, classes, and organizations can sign up to reserve a display table where they can have club information, decorations, games and/or crafts. Anyone, including local restaurants, can contribute food dishes for FoodFest. The fine arts department and performance groups can reserve five minute time slots to showcase music, dance, comedy, theater, fashion, magic or even poetry reading. Artists and the visual arts department can have artwork displayed in the artwalk, which will feature original artwork from all River Hill students who want to participate. HillFest is set for Tuesday, March 7th from 6 – 9 PM and registration is available on the RHDA’s website.