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| NewsSaturday, February 16, 2008 11:35 PM CST |
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Tragedy hits home at local universities
NORMAL — Less than one day after a gunman opened fire at Northern Illinois University, the tragedy seemed close to home to Central Illinois universities. Local campus leaders described students as being hit hard by the news of the shootings that left six dead, including the shooter, and 16 injured on the NIU campus at DeKalb. “For a lot of them, I think it was shock. We have a lot of students from up north, and they have family members and friends that attend Northern,” said Brian Sajko, Eureka College admissions and marketing vice president. “People are mostly just so sad. To know that somehow, that someone would do that — obviously ill in some way — but that they would do that,” he said. And though random, a trend of these school-grounds shootings seems to be developing, he added. The fact that the incident was on a college campus and in Illinois seemed to exaggerate the connection, some students said. “Especially after seeing it hit so close to home,” students were stunned, said Dave Horstein, ISU student body president, a senior from Manteno. “We just learned today that one of the shooting victims is a friend of one of our students,” said Kathy Cavins, vice president and dean of students of Illinois Wesleyan University, Bloomington. And she noted in the small world of academic professions, it’s certain college faculty and staff in Central Illinois have friends working at NIU. Like most colleges and universities in the area, IWU offered counseling Friday to anyone interested in it. IWU also sent an early morning message on Facebook and the campus intranet, inviting students, faculty and staff to a 10 a.m. “campus conversation” on the tragedy, in Evelyn Chapel. Eureka College had a noon prayer service at its Reagan Peace Garden. “I didn’t personally know anyone from Northern. But I have friends that do, and seeing their hurt and their pain was hard,” said Kimberlee Sandall, a Eureka sophomore from Pekin. She and her friends joined about 50 people for the service. “We all gave each other hugs — even though it didn’t happen here on our campus, we knew the randomness of it,” Sandall said. “We’re so close to them,” said Catherine Greene, an ISU junior from Crystal Lake. “It could happen at any school. … It’s a horrific thing to have happen.” At the Illinois State University board of trustees meeting Friday morning, ISU President Al Bowman opened the meeting by sharing the condolences ISU sent to NIU. He used the opportunity to reassure the campus that while no one can stop a random act of violence, college campuses such as ISU remain fairly safe havens overall. At IWU, Cavins fielded several calls from students and parents Friday with safety concerns. “When things like this happen, it just shakes things up. … Everybody wants assurance that this is a safe campus,” she said. David Proeber contributed to this report. E-mail this story | Print this story | Search archives | RSS Show comments |  Hide comments | Hide comments on all stories |
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