Is sidewalk chalk dieing?
 

More and more campuses are banning it. What do you think?

http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/story.hts/nation/1639015

We just passed a bill through the student government that governed sidewalk chalking.

It's not dieing but you must get a permit for it from the campus life office. Pretty simple to do really.

people chalk UF"s sidewalks like they are going out of style

I hope so. I find it incredibly tacky.

We have never been able to do chalking at my univ. They are super conservative for a large state school.

I honestly don't see a problem with chalking. At my alma mater, the sororities were really the only ones to chalk except during Homecoming and Student Government election time when everyone advertised their candidates on the sidewalks. A lot of the designs and pictures were very creative and people enjoyed seeing the messages.

I don't really see the point of having to get permission to chalk. The stuff washes off so easily that it wouldn't take anyone long to get rid of any inappropriate messages. Plus, the groups who chalk regularly (at least on my campus) never write anything hateful anyway. Those idiots who do want to spread hate through chalked messages certainly don't care about getting a permit for it -- they'll just do it in the dead of night like they always do. Having to get permits is, to me, sort of preaching to the choir in this case.

I don't know...on my campus it seems to me that they "discourage" Greeks from doing it, but I often see sidewalk chalk done by other groups on campus.

okay.. why are these universities being stupid.. its CHALK.. washes off with a lil splash of water..

In a way I agree with KappaTarzan, but I personally think that it does look rather tacky. On my campus, the way to let everyone know about your event is to tape flyers to the ground -- no chalk. It took a while to get used to, but I think that definitely looks better than chalk.

Personally I think chalk is better-

with fliers taped to the ground people walk around, riping it up, kicking it around, it contributes to litter.. plus the people most likely don't go aorund after the event to collect these fliers to its probably just a bunch of unnecessary paper flying around campus..

chalk is washed away sooo easy, doesn't damage a thing.. :D

Generally the flyers remain taped to the ground and don't cause any problems. Our campus is pretty small, so usually all you need is about 25 flyers disbursed throughout the campus. Of course flyers are also put in the caf and in other buildings, but we're not talking about that. :D

When I was in school, everywhere a sidewalk crossed on the Campus Green, circles with notices of upcoming events were painted (yes, painted) on the sidewalks. These became known as "kissing circles" for reasons which shouldn't be too hard to figure out.

Until last year, there was also a huge wall at the top of a bridge leading to the main campus known as the "Grafiti Wall" which was painted fairly often by Greek or other student organizations. An adjacent classroom building is being expanded, and the wall was torn down, but I think the university is going to replace it so the tradition can survive.

There was also chalking on other walks.

Seems like a nice tradition, providing it is used in good spirits, because, as someone else said, it's only chalk and will wash off.

Sidewalk chalking is alive and well at Wisconsin. It surprised me at first because at the University of Minnesota (I transferred from there) there was almost no chalking at all. But tons of groups here do it, and as far as I've seen it hasn't been abused, and it's a great way to spread information, so . . . why not?

way back when.....
 

Univ of Arkansas use to chalk a lot but that was back 7 yrs ago. I don't see it much on campus here at home in So. Calif. I see what Sax mentioned.... taped flyers to the ground more then i see chalk.

Laura

Yeah, but if it rains, the signs get wet, and people step all over them, they tend to clump up into pieces and get dragged around campus. Like phimusugar said, it can contribute to litter and most groups don't go around and collect them after the event.

Sidewalk chalking can actually be a great way of getting attention. I remember people signed us just because we had the biggest letters drawn on the sidewalk.

(don't people choose houses for dumb reasons?)

It can look pretty good though. At least one or two places you'll want to have something that looks GOOD. Then seal it with hairspray so it doesn't wash away (which most things inevitably do because it always rains right after we chalk).

There is definetly no side walk chalking at UIC. You could puke all over the place and it would take them weeks to clean it up but if you chalked even a little square they would have it clean before you could finish cleaning up your supplies.

Generally the entire flyer is taped, sort of like being laminated. For our campus, this has been the way that works best. I didn't invent it -- it's tradiation. :D

It's done very rarely at UMass- it rains about 130 days out of the year here, so there's a fairly good chance that it'll either get washed away, or that the sidewalk will be too wet.

We've had it banned on buildings- we've had the problem that some of our buildings (especially the Fine Arts Center) are made of materials that take in the chalk, and they have to be sandblasted to remove it.

ALL organizations at Florida Tech are big on chalking. However, we (A Phi) seem to be the only GLO that's really big on it. Every year for the night before initiation the new girls go out and chalk. Unfortunately this gets the anti-Greek people to make fun of our new members, but they just sound like bitter old codgers anyway. :p

Yeah! During homecoming all you say everywhere was "ABC loves XYZ"

There was also "Christy...your big sis loves you" before some houses had big sis revelations.

I remember this issue was brought up at UF... b/c people also like to litter campus with flyers for clubs and bars. So they were talking about how flyers have to handed to each person, not left everywhere.... and how chalk isn't allowed.

But who is going to enforce it??

I certainly hope this isn't banned at MTSU, as it is a chapter tradition for our us to write Big/Lil notes around campus such as, "Katie is the best Lil Sis!" or "ZTA Luvs Sarah", etc. It really makes a new member feel special to see her name written in public places all over campus & to be recognized as a new Zeta.

Oh- let me add also, that many other organizations use sidewalk chalk around campus to advertise various things, HOWEVER, I find it extremely tacky and even degrading when people have written on BUILDINGS with sidewalk chalk. Now THAT is just plain disrespectful to University property (not to mention a total eyesore- if it's on the ground u can just look up & ignore it, but not so if it's on a building). One example of this is where certain student "bands" (Recording Industry is a HUGE major here) advertise mini concerts by writing on buildings w/chalk. Grr.

We're allowed to use sidewalk chalk, but only in certain areas. The university restricted its use on buildings, trashcans, etc. for obvious reasons, but about a year or two ago, the restriction went to the pavers as well (the brick-like walkways). The reason being that it is harder to remove the chalk from the pavers than from the concrete walkways.

We never wrote on the sidewalk with chalk. I went to school in upstate NY, and it snowed from Halloween until Easter. When it wasn't snowing, it rained. That could be the reason we didn't do it.

We're required to chalk only in places where it can rain on the chalk. That means no walls or ground under an overhang. Past that, the university just requires that you follow the same content rules you'd follow if you had made up a flier. I think that it works fairly well.

Tacky
 

How is sidewalk chalking tacky? I think it's great -- it shows that your organizations are actually doing something on campus. Always a good sign.

I know what you're saying, but it doesn't always hold.

I'd think chalk would look better than taped flyers any day.

There was only one spot on campus that anyone chalked, but they did it all of the time. Especially the sororities. There was one main street through campus, and the sidewalks on either side of it usually had messages about events.

Our school doesn't have any kiosks, and you're not allowed to adhere (nail, tape, whatever) fliers to any trees. So chalking is the only way to really announce things other than fliers and signs inside buildings. I'm pretty sure the chalking was not regulated, but I never participated in it so I don't know for sure.

One time someone chalked "Boys are Dumb. Throw Rocks at Them." on the sidewalk. That was funny, but no one ever admitted to doing it.

That made me laugh! http://www.plaudersmilies.de/lol2.gif