A day to celebrate diversity is back for the second year in the Central Okanagan.
Around 200 middle school students will participate in the second Harmony Day conference Tuesday, Jan. 30 from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. at the Hollywood Education Centre.
The Harmony Day conference is a platform to inspire and foster collaboration with activities including keynote addresses, spoken word performance by Kinfolk and the best part of the day, the human library, according to a press release.
Community members of various ethnic and career backgrounds are invited to act as a human book where they share their stories and history. In small groups, the students move from book to book to listen, learn and share.
The organizers hope this conference will ignite the passions within the students in developing ideas to take back to their respective schools in preparation for the district-wide celebration of Harmony Day on Wednesday, Feb. 21.
Since 2006, the Central Okanagan School District has been promoting Harmony Day and celebrating it throughout the schools.
The idea to celebrate Harmony Day in the Okanagan was sparked when a colleague took children to visit an Australian school. It just so happened to be Harmony Day on this visit, originally celebrated in Australia, and what she and her children witnessed serves as our inspiration today, said the release.
Harmony Day in Australia is celebrated nationally on March 21 and is about bringing people together to promote Australian values and to celebrate community participation.
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