CBA Celebrates Diversity

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The CBA Step Team performed at the Multicultural Festival.

Members of the CBA Step Team performed.

The student body gathered to celebrate different cultures from around the world at the annual Multicultural Assembly on Feb. 11.

Kathe Harrington, who founded the Facebook Page Humans of Syracuse to highlight the rich diversity in the city, was the keynote speaker. Since she started her Facebook page, she has taken more than 1,700 street portraits. The page has over 19,000 followers from 45 countries around the world. Harrington showed and talked about some of her favorite portraits.

Kathe Harrington

With February being Black History month, Cydavia Patterson sang “Lift Every Voice and Sing.” The song is often called the Black National Anthem. The CBA step team, eighth grade Salsa dancer Analiese DeRoberts, sophomore Spanish guitarist Sebastian Escribano, and the Johnston School of Irish Dance performed. Senior Camille Cady-McCrea displayed many of her works of art and talked about how art is a primary medium for cultural expression.

Sebastian Escribano

Sophomore Tobis Okongo, who came to CBA from Kenya last September, compared his culture to American culture. Katie Kong and Kira Xiao, who are both from China, spoke about how their country has experienced changes in modern time.

Students recited Vietnamese spiritual teacher and writer, Thich Nhat Hahn’s quote “We are here to awaken from the illusion of our separateness” in various languages, including Mandarin, Spanish, French, Italian, Swahili, Hebrew, Hindi, and Tagalog, the language of the Philippines.