Pink symposium strives to beat record
Rachel Sauls
Issue date: 10/8/09 Section: News
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In order to succeed, there must be 3,600 participants on the field, all wearing pink, and the ribbon must be held and photographed from an airplane for ten minutes, Carol Oglesby, coordinator of the Pink Symposium and part of the student development staff said. "Hamilton County emergency management team will make a fly over at 4:45 p.m. for everyone in the ribbon," Oglesby said.
This attempt has already been registered with the Guinness World Records and will meet all the guidelines listed in the seven page handbook, Oglesby said.
"They are very serious about this type of thing," Oglesby said.
In addition to the Guinness World Record attempt, the Pink Symposium is a free breast cancer awareness conference for UTC students and members of the community more than 15 years old, Oglesby said.
The conference will include a variety of speakers, primarily focusing on breast cancer prevention, Oglesby said.
"Lots of times you hear that women college age cannot develop breast cancer, but that's just the farthest thing from the truth, especially with the environment the way it is and birth control methods, breast cancer among young women is increasing," Olgesby said.
Mammograms are not required until women are in their the 30s or 40s so self examinations are the main way women find their tumors, Oglesby said.
"Seventy-percent of tumors are found in breast self-examinations so if we don't teach how that's done properly, and if we don't encourage young women to do that on a regular basis, then chances are they may miss a tumor," Oglesby said.
The conference will also focus on African American women, who are ten percent more likely than Caucasian women to die from breast cancer, Oglesby said.
"In African American women, the tumors are more aggressive and larger once they develop," Oglesby said.
The conference is equally pertinent to male and female students, Oglesby said.
"If you don't have a hand in this fight, you need to get one because everyone on this campus will be affected by breast cancer at some point in their life whether it be themselves, their sister, their mother, their significant other," Oglesby said.
In addition to the Guinness attempt and the speakers, there will be live music by the Mason Singers, free T-shirts, snow cones, cotton candy, popcorn and pink lemonade, Oglesby said.
Hannah Gracy, a Chattanooga junior, said, "I think all cancer, but particularly breast cancer awareness, is really important for me as a woman to support and make other people aware of."
