Multicultural Week at CHSU

In February, CHSU faculty, staff and students organized Multicultural Week on campus in partnership with the Fresno County Behavioral Health office and Holistic Cultural and Education Wellness Center and its Cultural Brokers from the Fresno Center for New Americans! The week was filled with many engaging, entertaining, and educational activities to enrich the campus and learning experience! The week began with International Coffee/Tea and Dress Day.
  
The campus became alive with bright colors and amazingly ornate designs – many of which were hand-made and handed down from many generations. Students, faculty and staff adorned beautiful and elaborate attire from their culture or heritage.
Then everyone gathered for International Coffee and Tea hour to enjoy special brews from Ethiopia, Persia, Armenia, Thailand, Asia and other regions. Students also brought special serving dishes to demonstrate how the coffee or tea was to be brewed and enjoyed.
The second day was International Potluck and the Student Lounge was converted to an International buffet featuring delicious dishes from around the world. Each dish was labeled with the name, origin, ingredients to be sensitive to individuals’ dietary preferences or restrictions.
  
Lunch was enjoyed while attending a Cultural Competency presentation facilitated by Dr. Connie Cha from Fresno County Behavioral Health with information on how to be culturally sensitive and accommodating to people within our diverse community.
Day three took students to exotic destinations by way of informative presentations to learn about the cultural descriptions, practices, preferences, and attitudes and expectations from medical providers of four prevalent cultures in the Valley:

The Around the World presentation was enjoyed by the attendees and ended with an enlightened and reflective Q&A session.
Multicultural Week concluded with an Introduction to Spanish and Hmong medical terminology workshop that allowed students to learn key greetings and terminology to relate to their patients. The Spanish portion was facilitated by Roberto Garcia, P2 student, CHSU and the Hmong was facilitated by Dia Yang, Fresno Center for New Americans. Attendees enjoyed practicing their new language skills and received handouts for future reference.
The grand finale of the week was celebrated with the Multicultural and Talent Show, where music and dancing from various cultures was showcased and local dance students from the Polynesian Cultural Center of Fresno performed. Then the students, faculty and staff in attendance joined together to sing, “We are the World,” by Michael Jackson and other key artists.