By Abigail Cox, Second Year Journalism and Communications student and intern with Holland College Marketing and Communications

This week Holland College is hosting its 5th annual Embracing Diversity Fair, where international students are given the opportunity to share their culture and the traditions of their home country with staff and students.

The fair is hosted virtually again this year due to COVID regulations not easing soon enough to have something in person.

“We didn’t have enough time to be able to plan it in person, as restrictions just eased this week, and it takes months to plan. We are looking forward to having it in person again next year,” said Julia Clayton, a Recruiter and First Year Advisor at Holland College. 

The college currently has almost 500 international students from more than 50 different countries, making up about 25 percent of the college’s student population. 

“We want to make sure we are highlighting all of our students and giving them the opportunity to teach us about where they are from,” said Clayton. 

Some students are making cooking videos to share their traditional foods and other students have submitted videos that highlight the tourist areas from the towns they are from and their country.

Alibek Kalimolda, a first-year Computer Networking Technology student will be participating in the fair again this year.  Alibek is from Almaty, Kazakhstan in central Asia. He has been in P.E.I. since August 2021.

Last year, he introduced Kazakhstan traditions in the Embracing Diversity Fair. This year he is sharing more about his home and what tourists can do when they visit.

“A lot of people don’t even know about my country, so this is a good way for me to teach people about it,” said Alibek.

The Embracing Diversity Fair takes place all week starting Monday, March 21 at 11:30 a.m. and continuing until Friday, March 25 at 5:30 p.m on Facebook.

In this picture: Alibek Kalimolda, a first-year Computer Networking Technology student.