At a glance
The Chinese Student Association’s Lunar New Year Gala is an annual performance showcase that celebrates Chinese culture and… Read full summary
- Funding received
- 2024-2025
- Small
- Awarded
- $4,955
- Funding partners
-
- Services and Activities Fee (SAF)
- Website & social links
The Chinese Student Association’s Lunar New Year Gala is an annual performance showcase that celebrates Chinese culture and the Lunar New Year. Our performances run for roughly an hour and a half and include cultural celebrations such as traditional Chinese dance and the playing of traditional Chinese instruments. Besides the performance, we also reserve out rooms for attendees to further celebrate Chinese culture through traditional arts and crafts and an abundance of culturally significant decor.
The Chinese Student Association’s Lunar New Year Gala is an annual performance showcase that celebrates Chinese culture and the Lunar New Year. Our performances run for roughly an hour and a half and include cultural celebrations such as traditional Chinese dance and the playing of traditional Chinese instruments. Besides the performance, we also reserve out rooms for attendees to further celebrate Chinese culture through traditional arts and crafts and an abundance of culturally significant decor. We will be planning the entire event within a board of 30 officers, planning for activities and décor, performance, sponsorship, as well as marketing for the event.
CSF funding would be used to pay for the rooms we have booked in Kane Hall, which is a cost of $4,955. Traditionally, CSA has relied on school funding to host our major events.
CSA is tremendously committed to creating a more sustainable physical environment as well as supporting cultural ideology. When it comes to creating a sustainable physical environment, CSA has a fundamental belief in reducing waste and emissions. This means that we use eco-friendly materials whenever possible, including compostable marketing materials, compostable plates and utensils, and encourage waste sorting during our events.
CSA is inherently a club founded in supporting Chinese culture at the University of Washington, and our focus is to celebrate our culture through events that are accessible to all. This is especially important to us now in an era where Chinese culture has recently come under attack in the aftermath of COVID-19, and we want to do our part in creating a safe community where people can celebrate their heritage. We also want to acknowledge that our Lunar New Year Gala isn't just for people that are Chinese; traditionally we attract a diverse range of people who are all willing to celebrate our culture with us. This allows us to foster understanding of our organization and culture across a much larger community, and we want to do our part in sharing our culture.
Our project happens in different stages and will ultimately culminate on our event on Saturday, February 15th, from 5PM - 10PM. We have been in the planning process since the start of November, and have distributed leadership roles to 9 members in our organization. We are currently working on fundraising for the event, reaching out to performers, and selecting prizes. After the start of the new year, we will move into creating marketing materials as well as decor and activities for the event.
We have attached a picture of our Lunar New Year Gala last year as well celebrating our officers!
Leo Li
Project lead
- leoli03@uw.edu
- Affiliation
- Student
- Years
- 1 year(s) remaining at UW
- Affiliated groups
- Chinese Student Association, Alpha Theta Delta, Informatics Department
Perry Liu
Team member
- perryliu@uw.edu
- Affiliation
- Student
- Years
- 1 year(s) remaining at UW
- Affiliated groups
- Chinese Student Association, Phi Chi Theta Business Fraternity, Poker Theory Club, Foster School of Business
Zoe Lim
Team member
- zlim39@uw.edu
- Affiliation
- Student
- Years
- 1 year(s) remaining at UW
- Affiliated groups
- Phi Alpha Delta, Chinese Student Association, Public Health, LSJ
Renee Infelise
SAO Advisor
- reneei@uw.edu
- Affiliation and department
- Student Activities Office Advisor
Cass Nguyen
ECC Advisor
- cassn@uw.edu
- Affiliation and department
- Kelly Ethnic Cultural Center Advisor for Student Leadership
Request amount and budget
Plans for financial longevity
After the CSF funding ends, our project will look to sponsors within UW, such as the HUB RSO fund and UW Alumni Association to sponsor future events. We will also look further to external sources of funds that are not associated with UW, such as local apartments or banks in the area. Additionally, we try to conserve and reuse resources from year to year, which include performance equipment like amps, banners for decor, as well as activities and games. This allows us to generally reduce costs of many things year over year.
I have attached a detailed timeline below, but I will also summarize key activities here as well:
November 1st - Announce Lunar leads for the 4 committees
November 13th - Create Lunar committees
November 28th - Sponsorship needs to meet with SAO and ECC advisors for grant applications
December 29th - Sponsorship needs to finalize vendors and sponsors
January 6th - Marketing needs to finalize the overall design
January 13th - Performance needs to finalize the performing line-up and get pictures
January 15th - Sponsorship needs to pay for the reservation of Kane Hall and food permits
February 5th - Soft deadline for activities
Feburary 15th - LUNAR!
Plans for long-term project management
The Chinese Student Association's Annual Lunar New Year Gala has been successfully running for 58 years, and we hope that it will continue to run indefinitely. We have a tremendous succession process that has been created from years of success, which comes from leadership creating hand-off documents to their successors. These documents are incredibly detailed and cover exactly what the successor needs to do in their role, and also gives them a timeline to do this.
Additionally, a key part of the success of our organization comes from our history of leadership, and the expectation that people will want to lead our signature event. Our leadership for this project are traditionally seniors, but each lead for each committee takes on a younger sub-lead that they will mentor throughout the year. This allows the mentee to learn directly from the current leader, and allows them the unique opportunity to shadow them. This strategy will bring continued success to future projects, as the mentees will have that direct experience to lead each committee in the subsequent year.
Problem statement
The specific sustainability related issue at the UW that our project will aim to address is the issue of cultural ideology leading to issues in our community. While this project will try to preserve our physical environment through the use of biodegradable and reusable materials, the bulk of the project's focus will be on fostering sustainability through cultural ideology. We believe the Lunar New Year Gala is a great way to do this, as this event is one that brings the Seattle community together to celebrate the largest Chinese holiday of the year. We introduce Chinese cultural performances and cultural activities to a wide audience of students, families, and other locals in the Seattle community, and are able to share our culture in a safe space.
The creation of this project was over 50 years ago, but times are always changing. Our organization is made up of college students that have around 20 years of lived experience. We have witnessed and experienced Asian hate and the suppression of our culture, and we want to do what we can to change that. Because of these experiences, we have molded our Lunar New Year Gala into a free and open event that is encouraged for all to attend, so that we can spread our culture to a wider audience. We all want to feel safe to express our culture at the University of Washington and in our community. We believe that the Lunar New Year Gala is a great way to do something about that and get ourselves closer to that goal.
Problem context
Our project fits into the existing UW ecosystem of similar solutions because of the similarities of our event with other cultural clubs at the University of Washington. CSA is one cultural club of many at the UW, which has clubs such as the Japanese Student Association, Taiwanese Student Association, Indian Student Association, and many others. Ultimately, the main goals of our clubs are to create an environment where students can safely celebrate their culture and feel secure about their culture on campus. Other clubs do this through major events as well, such as the TSA's annual Night Market or JSA's annual Matsuri. These events differ from CSA's Lunar New Year Gala, but have the same underlying principle: Connecting hundreds of thousands of people together to celebrate our cultures. That is ultimately what the Lunar New Year Gala is about, and it compliments these existing iniatives from other organizations at the University of Washington.
We believe that the Lunar New Year Gala will further increase collective action in supporting our unique cultures and backgrounds at this school, and create a student community with a more diversified mindset of ideas.
Measure the impacts
| Impact / goal | Metric(s) of success | UW stakeholders impacted |
|---|---|---|
| Create a community-empowering event | Attract a record attendance of 1000 people | Undergraduate, Graduate, Alumni, Academic staff, Admin staff |
| Build a more inclusive community that teaches people about Chinese culture | Increase participation in Chinese cultural activities to over 150 people | Undergraduate, Graduate, Alumni, Academic staff, Admin staff |
Communication tactics and tools
Our key communication tactics revolves around the marketing committee we have for the Lunar New Year Gala. Traditionally, we have spent money on advertising on Facebook and Instagram in promoting our marketing material, purchased lawn signs to place around campus, and put up posters in UW buildings and restaurants on the Ave. This communication has worked in the past, and we have generally seen a rising amount of people attend our event year over year. The main group that benefits from our marketing deliverables are students, who will almost certainly come across some form of advertisement for our event just by walking around campus and attending classes. We also ask other organizations at UW to post our marketing on their social medias, truly bringing our event to the attention of the majority of students at the UW. However, our scope is not just limited to our school. We also partner with restaurants in the Chinatown International District to promote our event to the general Seattle area, and often see attendance from individuals that aren't affiliated with the University of Washington.
Additionally, we also will be tabling in Red Square for the month leading up to the Lunar New Year Gala, and will be promoting our event to anyone that comes up to our table. Traditionally, we attract roughly 75 students or visitors a week to our tabling, and we expect this to be a key part in attracting people to attend our event, especially because they have face to face communication with the officers that will be running the event.
Outreach communication plan
Our outreach communication plan is to share our impact with the UW community through our marketing efforts. Through our marketing, we really want to highlight the importance of cultural celebrations and learning about various cultures to become more educated in a diversified community. From our marketing deliverables, we believe that the UW community will heavily benefit just by learning a little bit about us, as well as the overall Seattle community as a whole.
Student involvement
Yes, our project does include components focused on student professional development and mentorship. The entirety of the project is led by current students, and our lead and sub-lead system allows us to mentor and train students to become future leads in their respective positions. These opportunities are crucial for leadership development, and allows our organization the unique opportunity to genuinely develop younger students into future leaders.
Problem statement
The specific sustainability related issue at the UW that our project will aim to address is the issue of cultural ideology leading to issues in our community. While this project will try to preserve our physical environment through the use of biodegradable and reusable materials, the bulk of the project's focus will be on fostering sustainability through cultural ideology. We believe the Lunar New Year Gala is a great way to do this, as this event is one that brings the Seattle community together to celebrate the largest Chinese holiday of the year. We introduce Chinese cultural performances and cultural activities to a wide audience of students, families, and other locals in the Seattle community, and are able to share our culture in a safe space.
The creation of this project was over 50 years ago, but times are always changing. Our organization is made up of college students that have around 20 years of lived experience. We have witnessed and experienced Asian hate and the suppression of our culture, and we want to do what we can to change that. Because of these experiences, we have molded our Lunar New Year Gala into a free and open event that is encouraged for all to attend, so that we can spread our culture to a wider audience. We all want to feel safe to express our culture at the University of Washington and in our community. We believe that the Lunar New Year Gala is a great way to do something about that and get ourselves closer to that goal.
Problem context
Our project fits into the existing UW ecosystem of similar solutions because of the similarities of our event with other cultural clubs at the University of Washington. CSA is one cultural club of many at the UW, which has clubs such as the Japanese Student Association, Taiwanese Student Association, Indian Student Association, and many others. Ultimately, the main goals of our clubs are to create an environment where students can safely celebrate their culture and feel secure about their culture on campus. Other clubs do this through major events as well, such as the TSA's annual Night Market or JSA's annual Matsuri. These events differ from CSA's Lunar New Year Gala, but have the same underlying principle: Connecting hundreds of thousands of people together to celebrate our cultures. That is ultimately what the Lunar New Year Gala is about, and it compliments these existing iniatives from other organizations at the University of Washington.
We believe that the Lunar New Year Gala will further increase collective action in supporting our unique cultures and backgrounds at this school, and create a student community with a more diversified mindset of ideas.
Measure the impacts
| Impact / goal | Metric(s) of success | UW stakeholders impacted |
|---|---|---|
| Create a community-empowering event | Attract a record attendance of 1000 people | Undergraduate, Graduate, Alumni, Academic staff, Admin staff |
| Build a more inclusive community that teaches people about Chinese culture | Increase participation in Chinese cultural activities to over 150 people | Undergraduate, Graduate, Alumni, Academic staff, Admin staff |
Communication tactics and tools
Our key communication tactics revolves around the marketing committee we have for the Lunar New Year Gala. Traditionally, we have spent money on advertising on Facebook and Instagram in promoting our marketing material, purchased lawn signs to place around campus, and put up posters in UW buildings and restaurants on the Ave. This communication has worked in the past, and we have generally seen a rising amount of people attend our event year over year. The main group that benefits from our marketing deliverables are students, who will almost certainly come across some form of advertisement for our event just by walking around campus and attending classes. We also ask other organizations at UW to post our marketing on their social medias, truly bringing our event to the attention of the majority of students at the UW. However, our scope is not just limited to our school. We also partner with restaurants in the Chinatown International District to promote our event to the general Seattle area, and often see attendance from individuals that aren't affiliated with the University of Washington.
Additionally, we also will be tabling in Red Square for the month leading up to the Lunar New Year Gala, and will be promoting our event to anyone that comes up to our table. Traditionally, we attract roughly 75 students or visitors a week to our tabling, and we expect this to be a key part in attracting people to attend our event, especially because they have face to face communication with the officers that will be running the event.
Outreach communication plan
Our outreach communication plan is to share our impact with the UW community through our marketing efforts. Through our marketing, we really want to highlight the importance of cultural celebrations and learning about various cultures to become more educated in a diversified community. From our marketing deliverables, we believe that the UW community will heavily benefit just by learning a little bit about us, as well as the overall Seattle community as a whole.
Student involvement
Yes, our project does include components focused on student professional development and mentorship. The entirety of the project is led by current students, and our lead and sub-lead system allows us to mentor and train students to become future leads in their respective positions. These opportunities are crucial for leadership development, and allows our organization the unique opportunity to genuinely develop younger students into future leaders.