The event celebrates National Newspaper Week.
By Linda Owens
lowens24@student.alamo.edu
This college’s chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists will sponsor Chalk Day 10 a.m.-12:20 p.m. Oct. 9 in the mall south of Loftin Student Center and north of the chemistry and geology building.
Chalk will be supplied in buckets. All students and faculty members are welcome to draw, illustrate and write down their thoughts.
SPJ would like students to express themselves, Mandy Derfler, journalism-photography academic unit assistant, said Oct. 7. She is the sponsor of the campus chapter.
SPJ members ask that participants do not write on walls or express profanity, she said.
This event scheduled in conjunction with National Newspaper Week Oct. 6-12.
Chalk Day celebrates five freedoms guaranteed in the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
The theme this week is “Think F1rst – Know Your FIVE Freedoms.”
The First Amendment guarantees free speech, freedom to assemble, freedom to practice religion, freedom of the press and freedom to assemble peaceably.
Chalk Day started in the early 2000s after a student brought chalk to draw on brick walkways. A representative of the office of student life discouraged him and required him to clean off the chalk marks.
The Ranger wrote an editorial on allowing students to express themselves with chalk on campus. The following year The Ranger sponsored Chalk Day, and it has been a tradition ever since, SPJ President Rogelio Escamilla said.
In subsequent years, members of the college community have created poems, song lyrics, artwork, maps and political, religious and romantic messages.
For more information, contact Escamilla at 210-273-3331 or email rescamilla69@student.alamo.edu.