Eight Newtown High School (NHS) students who were recognized at the Rotary Club's Rotary Youth Leadership Awards (RYLA) earlier this spring are planning to host a culture fair later this fall.

The culture fair is tentatively scheduled for Saturday, October 3; it will be free, open to the public, and held on the front lawn outside Newtown Middle School (NMS). In case of inclement weather, the culture fair will be held in the middle school's gymnasium.

According to Kenneth Miller, an incoming NHS sophomore and one of the RYLA-recognized students, the culture fair will have food from local businesses and a raffle, along with live music played by a band for the majority of the event.

Miller said the goal of the event is to help Newtown be more connected and celebrate the cultures of its residents.

"We're really hoping that we can help Newtown become a more unified place and help celebrate the cultures that make us so great," Miller explained. "With everything that’s going on right now, times are rough for individuals from certain ethnic backgrounds, and we feel that those backgrounds should be supported instead of discouraged, like they have been."

The RYLA-recognized students are Ian Akbas, Emma Dever, Ali Elawa, Eshal Jarrar, Ellie Lemieux, Jay Madhavan, Kenneth Miller, and Ari Tersigni-Bjugan.

They were chosen by their counselors for their leadership abilities to represent Newtown High School for RYLA, an intensive leadership experience organized by Rotary Clubs and districts for teenagers and young adults to develop their skills while having fun and making connections.

Miller said the students did several community projects, such as gardening near Newtown Community Center and in the general Fairfield Hills area.

The biggest event of RYLA is when participants are split into groups and are tasked to create their own service project, according to Miller. All of the NHS students, sans Miller, sat in one group and decided on a culture fair. Every group presented their ideas, and the NHS group ended up winning first place.

For winning, the NHS students received a grant of $300 from the Rotary Club to help put on the culture fair. Miller decided to tag along, and joined the group in planning for the event.

The RYLA-recognized students picked a date, and have gone on to hold two meetings with NMS Principal Jim Ross and NMS Assistant Principal Brian Walsh to plan the event further. Miller said this is because the middle school held its second annual Cultural Fair this past March, with over 150 people between students, staff, and parents coming together to celebrate countries from all over the world.

"The difference between ours and theirs is that theirs is less open to people outside of Newtown or to groups that aren’t already established organizations, while ours is just more anybody can come. Anybody can have a table as long as they fill out the form first," Miller said.

He continued by saying they are at the point where they have the space booked. All they have to do, Miller said, is successfully receive a temporary food service license application from Newtown Health District.

Seven of the eight RYLA-recognized students met on Tuesday, July 28 inside C.H. Booth Library to discuss the culture fair. They split into two groups: one dedicated to designing a flyer, and the other dedicated to finalizing the temporary food service license application and the table assignment form for the event.

As of the morning of Wednesday, August 5, Miller said they are hoping to have their forms and flyers out by the end of next week. They also recently met with Newtown Health District, which is helping the group get approval. However, Miller said they need to know everything that is being served before they can get the temporary food service license.

Reporter Jenna Visca can be reached at jenna@thebee.com.