STAND will host Tents for Hope on Wednesday to bring awareness and messages of hope.
The Ohio University chapter of STAND is using an element of art to get students involved and to bring awareness to world conflicts.
The chapter, an organization with the mission of raising awareness and employing advocacy against genocide, is bringing awareness to worldwide conflicts, including genocide, mass atrocities and displacement. OU’s first Tents for Hope starting at 11 a.m.
To get the crowd involved, four large tents will be displayed to represent refugee tents around the world and students will have the opportunity to paint on the blank tents, said co-President of STAND Ehrin Lingeman, a senior studying global studies and French.
“(The event is) getting a younger student population to consider human rights violations elsewhere around the world that we don’t always hear about when we’re in a tight knit community like Athens,” she said.
Tents for Hope was first an installment in Washington D.C. with artwork from refugee camps and other areas of conflict. OU’s STAND chapter is trying to create something similar, said campaigns coordinator for STAND Luke Kubacki, a junior studying African studies and political science.
“(We also want) to bring awareness to and a sense of connection to the people who are profoundly affected by conflicts such as these,” Kubacki said. “It’s millions of people.”
The Arabic Language Student Association, Center for Law, Justice and Culture, the Global Leadership Center and Ohio Global Studies Union are also collaborating to put on the event, which creates a space to host information about worldwide conflicts and to reach out to students who want to help, Lingeman said.
STAND is collecting money for Action for CAR (Central African Republic) because of the violence that has been occurring there for the past two years, Kubacki said.
“It’s kind of a two pronged approach: giving people the ability to take action and also just giving people the agency of knowing that action is possible,” he said.
The event helps to create a dialogue where each individual’s voice can be heard, especially when it is easy to feel bombarded and powerless with everything happening across the world, Lingeman said.
Even though it is the first year, Lingeman hopes the event can continue to bring awareness and help people get involved.
“We have completely blank tents and we hope that through the years, people will continue this event and build on the tents and even get more tents for larger displays in the coming years,” she added.
Tents for Hope was originally set for April 8 but was rescheduled, due to weather, to April 15.
@liz_backo
eb823313@ohio.edu
