Organizers have decided to move the 25th annual African-American Heritage Festival to April 21-27 to deter the large number of students from other schools from over-populating the campus area.
“They (student organizers) moved the festival to April as a way to reduce the number students attending from area colleges and universities who end their semesters in May,” said Belinda Higgs, interim coordinator for the Office of African-American Student Services.
Additionally, all Heritage Festival events will be held indoors, except for the campus cleanup.
The theme for this year is “Ahali,” which means “family” in Swahili. Students want the Heritage Festival to bring back its original ideals of “celebrate, educate and share” the black culture with everyone.
“We took a close look at the direction of the festival over the past years and felt that it was moving away from its purpose,” said Angela Woody, student chair of the festival. “Given our concerns and those of others in the community regarding crowds and traffic, we decided to make the changes necessary to maintain that focus.”
The changes include the discontinuance of the Town Square Arts Festival on The Oval and the relocation of the step show and dance from the Schottenstein Center to the Columbus Convention Center.
The biggest changes were made to the weekend schedule. Last year, more than 3,000 people came to campus for the weekend activities.
A tradition that has occurred concurrently with the Heritage Festival is a “cruise,” which has clogged Columbus streets and campus roads in the past.
“The lower number of events on campus might affect the level of traffic, but probably not. Our plans won’t change much,” said Sherry Mecurio, spokeswoman for the Columbus police. “We’ve only ever had a problem with the cruise, which isn’t an official event within the festival.”
Some of the events set up by the organizers are strictly for Ohio State students and a guest. Security guards and police will be stationed to see the events do not get out of hand.
On Saturday, a campus community cleanup and an artists’ workshop will be held on campus while the Ohio Stadium will be filled with fans for the annual spring football game.
Additional details about the Heritage Festival will be available at the beginning of spring quarter.
