After a student-written petition to have smoking banned from MSU’s campus gained serious attention via social media and word of mouth, the MSU Anti-Cancer Society planned to bring the results to the Board of Trustees. However, just before the meeting Provost June Pierce Youatt published a memo announcing a task force designed to make MSU a tobacco-free campus.
Tristan Worthington and Clare O’Kane from ACS were planning to present their petition with over 1,500 signatures, as well as research from the University Physician’s Office as an argument that MSU should become a tobacco-free campus.
“We originally planned to bring this information to the Board of Trustees’ attention,” said Worthington, who is the organization’s president. “But we changed our speech to better concern student support and working together for a smoke-free campus.”
Worthington and O’Kane were given six minutes to appeal to the Board of Trustees at the end of their meeting on Feb. 6. They were also able to speak directly to President Lou Anna K. Simon, Vice President of Student Affairs and Services Denise Maybank and Youatt.
Despite official efforts to make MSU tobacco-free, ACS will receive no official funding and still needs student support.
The Anti-Cancer Society will soon begin promoting the petition again, as well as holding fundraising events on campus.
“To get ASMSU and COGS representatives on board would speed up the process,” said Worthington. “We are going to start an email campaign to get (them) to come forward and commend our efforts.”
ACS leadership also met with David Weismantel, the university physician and head of the tobacco-free task force.
Weismantel revealed some of the details of the task force, including the three major subcommittees.
The Health and Wellness Subcommittee will handle promoting the dangers of smoking, while Enforcement and Regulation will officially deal with the implementation of new policies. There is also a Communication and Marketing Subcommittee that will spread awareness about the entire task force.
The Anti-Cancer Society noted the university has tried similar efforts before and failed, but believes with enough student support, MSU’s campus could be entirely tobacco-free by the end of the year.
