Connor Cochrane will be attending Channing Hall this fall.

He came with his mother, Liz, to Channing Hall’s Family Multicultural Night and Art Show at the end of the school year to get a flavor of the school.

They already had checked out the art on display.

“I liked the animals made out of clay; they’re really good,” Connor said.

Now they were sampling some of the international dishes from the food trucks.

“We’re wanting to see the Celtic dancers because his dad is from Ireland,” Liz Cochrane said. “We like the feel of Channing Hall. We’ve checked out several charter schools and this is the best fit for him.”

Channing Hall’s night featured the student art show, a Japanese culture fair and henna tattoos inside the school and a stage outside on the grass for performances.

The Cook family was inside checking out the displays inside.

“Three of my kids attend school here so it’s fun to see the art and we like coming to see the different cultural presentations,” Megan Cook said. “I’m excited to see some of the dances; we’ve already seen the martial arts presentation.”

Her middle school daughter, Ruby, helped the kindergartners make fish that were on display, so she was wanting to check those out.

“This is my last year here; I came last year,” Ruby said. “I like it here. There’s a lot of one-on-one learning so you get more attention. Some of my classes are really small; my math class has only nine people in it so there’s a lot of individualized learning here. It’s nice because everyone knows everyone and everyone has something in common with someone else. There’s only 56 of us versus 300 kids in my grade at my last school.”

Her mother also appreciates that since some of the public schools her children attended had large class sizes, one of Ruby’s previous classes had more than 40 students at the Alpine School District school.

“We heard good things about Channing Hall so we decided to give it a try and it’s been really good,” Megan Cook said. 

They were keeping an eye on Ruby’s younger siblings, fourth-grader William and second-grader Lyla who were checking out the art on display and wanting to get back to the performances.

An Italian aria, a martial arts demonstration, a lively heel and toe polka, a graceful Chitrakaavyadance, an energetic Irish dance, a bag pipe performance and music provided by the Channing Hall choir were on the center stage’s lineup for the event.

Second-graders Sarayu Bandaru and Gowri Krishna were playing on the monkey bars wearing traditional dresses from India.

“I like we get to show our favorite dresses from our country during the parade of nations tonight,” Gowri said.

The two had learned the Mexican hat dance along with their classmates for the multicultural night and were going to be going on stage shortly.

“The best part of the multicultural night is we get to perform for everyone,” Sarayu said. “It’s a fun night.”