Richmond Folk Festival returns, college students don’t
Photo by Julie Tripp.
This past weekend the 12th annual Richmond Folk Festival represented the different cultures and demographics that compose RVA, with the exception of a vital part of the city: college students.
Grandparents danced beside high schoolers to the beat of Dori Freeman’s songs while parents ate Boka Truck’s tacos with 10 year olds — but few college students could be spotted among the crowd.
According to volunteer Genevieve Solomon, over the 10 years she has attended and volunteered at the festival, only last year saw an increase in the number of college students. This was because of the performance by DJ Grandmaster Flash, she said.
A variety of cultures were represented at the festival through different forms of music, dance, speeches, food and puppetry. But somehow college students were still lacking physical representation at the actual event.
“Most students barely leave campus,” said VCU senior Ardilla Deneys. “There are no ads on campus and no faculty talk about it. It’s free, there are big names. It seems like students would want to come, but most of them can’t drink.”
Solomon said with different and more in-depth advertising more college students may be more interested in attending the event.
“They should call it an Americana Festival,” Deneys said.
Hannah Parker, Staff Writer
