Symbol and Impact
The Alma Mater has long been a public symbol of the University of Illinois. Her image is currently the profile image for the official University Twitter account, figures prominently on the University website, and the statue is featured on the i-Card, the official university identification card for the flagship Urbana-Champaign campus.
The statue is sometimes adorned to reflect current events. In 2005, during the Final Four, the Alma Mater sported an Illini jersey. In 2007, the Alma Mater was decorated with a variety of red, orange, and blue roses to signify the Illinois football team's Rose Bowl appearance. In 2010, the Alma Mater was decorated with a UIUC cap and gown custom-made by Herff Jones to signify the University's graduation exercises.
In the 2012-13 absence of the statue, it has become popular for students to don costumes mimicking the Alma Mater's robes and pose on the empty granite base.
Read more about this topic: Alma Mater (Illinois Sculpture)
Famous quotes containing the words symbol and/or impact:
“Mysticism is the mistake of an accidental and individual symbol for an universal one.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“The question confronting the Church today is not any longer whether the man in the street can grasp a religious message, but how to employ the communications media so as to let him have the full impact of the Gospel message.”
—Pope John Paul II (b. 1920)