Restrictions on chalking implemented to ‘beautify’ campus, UMD says

First published Jan. 23, 2024 in Stories Beneath the Shell.

University of Maryland President Darryll Pines announced a new policy for chalking on Nov. 27. Overnight, students at the University of Maryland were prohibited from chalking in all but two places on campus: In front of the Adele H. Stamp Student Union and at Hornbake Plaza.

Why? 

“The president is really clear that he doesn’t want a campus that looks like it’s graffitied all the time,” Vice President of Student Affairs Patty Perillo said in an interview on Dec. 14. “It just creates a visual dynamic that takes away from the beautification of the campus.”

The university enacted the temporary policy about two weeks after a student chalked “Holocaust 2.0” at a rally in Hornbake Plaza calling for a cease-fire in the war between Israel and the Gaza Strip. 

Pictures of the chalked message, one of dozens on the plaza, went viral on social media.  National news outlets picked up the story, saying the message called for a second Holocaust.

Later, Students for Justice in Palestine, which organized the rally, posted an Instagram story condemning antisemitism.

“We aim to end the genocide and call that university administration recognizes their complicit actions as they continue to profit and fund the creation of weapons that harm innocent Palestinians every day,” the statement read. 

“UMD SJP is a community for students to speak out against injustice and war crimes, we do not condone any antisemitism, islamophobia, or hate speech that arises and we request that students remember this at all points in time,” the statement continued.

The evening of the rally, a member told Stories Beneath the Shell that the chalked message was a misguided attempt to point out parallels between the war in Gaza which had already killed over 10,500 Palestinians, according to official estimates, and the Holocaust, which killed about six million Jews. 

Once the group realized the comparison was “not accurate,” the organizer speaking on condition of anonymity said, the group crossed out the chalk.

The clarification, though, did not stop a wave of outrage in the University of Maryland community. The outrage only grew as videos of students chanting, “There is only one solution, intifada, revolution” at the same protest circulated. 

University leaders kicked their response into high gear.

Students for Justice in Palestine’s story condemning antisemitism disappeared from the group’s Instagram 24 hours later, and with it, any mention of the problematic chalking. The outrage didn’t disappear.

This is the first time the university has restricted chalking on campus, but not the first time chalked messages have caused controversy. In September, Preventing Sexual Assault organizers chalked explicit, uncensored descriptions of rape and sexual harassment across campus as part of Catcalls of College Park, inspired by the Catcalls of NYC movement. 

In response, an uproar ensued online. The student organization posted a video apologizing for the chalking. The administration did not issue a statement.

Asked why the university had restricted chalking only following the controversy covered in national news, Perillo said the fall semester brought a “significant increase” in events and chalking, showing the university where it needed to improve.

“When there is added pressure, no matter what it is, systems get pressed and gaps get revealed,” she wrote in an email to Stories Beneath the Shell. “As a result, we need to review the chalking policy; hence the interim policy for now. We will also review other practices and policies related to campus events.”

Pressed on whether chalkings with political messages could truly be called “graffiti,” Perillo pivoted and emphasized that other community members agreed with the policy. The main reason for the policy, Perillo added, is that the university doesn’t have enough staff to monitor chalked messages all over campus. 

“We just don’t have the bandwidth to do that every day,” she said. “Most or many college campuses don’t have don’t allow for talking at all. We said no, we want students to have some free speech opportunity.”

“Let’s right now just have it in two places with the expectation that the new policy may have three or four places and we’d be OK with that,” she added.

A Students for Justice in Palestine organizer speaking on condition of anonymity said the university’s reason made some sense but also noted that the new policies only came after the national controversy.

Uri Garfunkel, the president of the Orthodox Jewish student group Kedma at the university, welcomed the changes, saying that it would help Jewish students’ mental health.

Until Nov. 27, the university allowed students to chalk on flat sidewalks across campus but nevertheless hosed down messages in solidarity with Palestine twice.

On Nov. 13, students chalked messages across campus, on the McKeldin Mall sundial, McKeldin Mall, the Edward St. James Teaching and Learning Center, the Yahentimtsi Dining Hall, the Nyamburu Cultural Center and the Stamp Student Union.

The university hosed down not only the messages written on the stairs of the Yahentimitsi Dining Hall, which violated university policy, but all the chalk.

Two days later, Students for Justice in Palestine organizers chalked messages again at the McKeldin sundial and in front of Stamp. Again, the university hosed down the messages.

In an interview, Perillo said the Facilities Management employees who hosed down the messages misunderstood the instructions and “thought they were supposed to wash it all away.” 

“I apologized. I said that was our fault,” she said, incorrectly adding that the incident happened during the first days of the new chalking policy. “It was a mistake by Facilities Management.”