Last modified: Tuesday, March 31, 2009
IU campus bus to deliver smoke-free message to students
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
March 31, 2009
BLOOMINGTON, Ind. -- Indiana University steps up its tobacco-free efforts Thursday (April 2) with the roll-out of a campus bus sporting an exterior freshly wrapped in a spicy "stop smoking" advertisement.
IU students, faculty and staff are invited to enjoy music and refreshments while attending Thursday's unveiling of a campus bus sporting a new "red hot" anti-smoking message.
The latest "Tobacco Free IUB" effort, extolled with a vivid what's hot (the seven-foot-tall red pepper) and what's not (crumpled tobacco butt) message, will be unveiled as a wrap-around billboard on a 40-foot-long campus bus at noon Thursday at the IU Health Center.
With the help of sponsors IU Recreational Sports, Scholars Inn Bakehouse, Bloomington Bagel, Insomnia Cookies, Marsh and Kroger, and a little musical entertainment set to begin just prior to noon, the unveiling is anticipated to take on the atmosphere of a party.
Expected to speak are Dean of Students and Vice Provost for Student Affairs Richard McKaig, IU Director of Health and Wellness Education Cathlene Hardy Hansen and Hugh Jessop, director of the IU Health Center. IU students who have successfully stopped smoking will give testimonials, and representatives from the Indiana Tobacco Cessation and Prevention (ITPC) Trust Fund also will be on hand. ITPC provided a $10,000 grant that paid for the wrap and a one-year contract to display it on the bus.
"Young adults are in a particularly risky situation when they choose to use tobacco, because most of them consider themselves 'social smokers' and plan on giving it up very soon," said Neva Cottam, tobacco cessation educator at the IU Health Center. "The problem is, one in three of them will become a lifelong tobacco user. Young people always feel they will not be affected the way their parents or grandparents were by tobacco use."
Cottam said that each and every one of the nearly 100 students that have received counseling on tobacco use at the center since the cessation program began reported declining health because of tobacco use.
The formal program is expected to end at 12:30 p.m., when snacks and tobacco-free promotional materials will be offered along with noisemakers to those wishing to take a ride around campus on the bus.
For more information, please contact Steve Chaplin, Office of Communications, at 812-856-1896 or stjchap@indiana.edu
