Kids-Fair entertains area youth

By Elizabeth Kassab

Daily Staff Reporter

"Ready? Go!"

At Business senior Raj Ramanan's mark, groups of University and elementary school students raced against each other to see who could build the tallest stack of Legos in a minute. The towers had to be able to stand on their own, and the winners got candy, from Ramanan and other students from the Michigan BBA Transfer Club, which took part in the second annual Kids-Fair at Crisler Arena on Friday.

The BBA Transfer Club was one of more than 110 student groups at the fair, which was sponsored by K-grams - a mentorship program bringing University and area elementary students together.

K-grams, short for "Kids Programs," is a student-run organization dedicated to forging a connection between University students and local schools. University students and elementary school students are paired up and exchange letters for one year.

Besides providing a fun environment for the kids at the fair, the events organizers said they hoped to get all K-grams' participants together under one roof for the first time this year.

This year's Kids-Fair was "at least two to three times bigger than last year," said K-grams direc- tor and founder Rishi Moudgil, a Business senior.

The 1,050 elementary students were entertained by members of the student groups at the fair, which increased from 70 last year.

The number of pen pals increased, as did the number of "buddies," volunteers who spent time with kids whose pen pals couldn't attend the event. "At some points it looked as though there were more college kids than elementary," Moudgil said.

K-grams has held other activities such as ice skating and trick-or-treating to bring the pen pals together, but the Kids-Fair was the largest event of the year. For many, Friday was the first opportunity to meet their pen pals face-to-face.

"It's fun to see the person you write to," said Pittsfield Elementary fifth grader Faraz Ansari, who spent time with his pen pal, LSA sophomore Anita Vashn.

Mitchell Elementary School fourth-grader Crystal Wood played Twister and musical chairs, but "my favorite part of the day was seeing my pen pal," she said.

Nearly every student group that participated in Friday's Kids-Fair held their activity to entertain the elementary students. "This year we wanted a lot more activities to be about learning or educational in some capacity," Moudgil said.

"Both elementary and college students learned a lot, not just from the activities but about each other, which is one of the main parts of the program," he said.

Amid the face-painting, cookie decorating and pasta necklace-making were booths that combined both fun and learning.

Vetal Elementary School fourth-grader Erica Young said she liked Alpha Epsilon Delta's erupting volcano display. "I like the way it spouted," she said. Some organizations structured their activities to fit the group's purpose. The Solar Car team brought a vehicle for kids to sit in.

"The kids really enjoyed the activities," Holmes Elementary fourth grade teacher Pat Delaney said. Delaney praised the K-grams program as "one of the most worthwhile programs I've been involved in in 25 years."

She added that "some kids never even thought about college and now they've become a big part of it."

One major goal of K-grams was to get the University community to "interact with elementary schools on a more consistent basis."

The idea for a Kids-Fair came up last year as a way to get the pen pals to meet each other, said Moudgil, who founded K-grams in the summer of 1998. K-grams "gives elementary school kids a new perspective, a new way of looking at college." In order to show the kids what college is like it seemed logical to show off the campus at an event where much of the University community could be involved, Moudgil said.

JOANNA PAINE/Daily

Engineering sophomore Eric Beaser teaches elementary school student Shantel Johnson to drive a solar car at Kids-Fair on Friday at Crisler Arena.