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UK Holds "Kick Butts Day" Event

The University of Kentucky held the second Annual Kick Butts Day on Tuesday.   WUKY student reporter Chase Cavanaugh stopped by the Student Center Commons and filed this report.

Here on campus, it is common to see students passing time between classes, chatting or playing a game of hackey-sack.  Yet Tuesday, they were kicking a pack of cigarettes.  The activity was part of Kick Butts Day, an antismoking campaign sponsored by the University’s Tobacco-Free task force, and Student Health Advisory Council. 

Handprint-covered sheets were hung underneath the patio of the Student Center, each print representing five  lives lost per year to tobacco.  Black prints represented the 30% of student tobacco users.

Student Brittany Bowen hopes that the event encourages compliance with UK’s campus smoking ban.

"You know personally I have said something to a couple of people smoking on campus because I think since there is a ban and not to mention that it’s hurting our health, they shouldn’t be doing it on campus.  Also I mean we’re just trying to create awareness and let them know we’re here to them if they want to stop smoking.”

Attendees could also browse booths to get information about the health effects of tobacco usage and smoking cessation programs.

Chase Cavanaugh first got on the air as a volunteer reader for Central Kentucky Radio Eye, a local news service for the visually impaired. He began reporting for WUKY in February 2012, after receiving his Master’s degree from the University of Kentucky’s Patterson School of Diplomacy and International Commerce.