OSU students banner together

As Kati Skinner strolled through the Oval after class Tuesday afternoon, she saw a group gathered around a table near Orton Hall.

Next to the table was a cloth banner containing hundreds of messages of sorrow and support written by the Ohio State community for those involved with the tragedy that occurred on the Virginia Tech campus Monday.

"It's nice to have people that you don't even know rallying for you and giving you strength," said Skinner, a junior in sociology.

InterVarsity Christian Fellowship, a campus organization committed to serving and supporting others, put up the banner that read, "What does this mean to you?" to show support for the VT community. ICF also collected postcards with messages to VT students and handed out ribbons in the school colors of burnt orange and Chicago maroon.

Some of the quotes read: "OSU stands with VT," "My heart, prayers and tears go out to VT," "You've got the Buckeye support on your side" and "Have faith. Stay strong."

Members of ICF wanted to let students in Virginia know their prayers were with them.

"We wanted to have something to send them, and give OSU students a way to process the situation," said Emily Beck, co-president of ICF.

Beck, a senior in social work, said the organization's leadership team held a meeting to discuss how to respond to the tragedy.

"We want to show them that people outside of VT care," she said.

Alice Liu, ICF co-president, thinks the issue is relevant to more than just the VT campus.

"This is a problem any community could have," she said. Liu, a senior in sociology, said she wants students to remember something like this could occur at any university.

David Lowery, a freshman in Korean and international studies, is from Virginia and has several friends who attend VT.

"It's a really small community that needs our support," Lowery said after signing the banner.

Beck said ICF will eventually send the banner and all of the postcards to VTU.

ICF will be on the Oval again Wednesday starting at 10 a.m. collecting more messages from those who want to show their support. They will also hold a memorial service Thursday at 8 p.m. in the Psychology Building, room 002.

Rick Krumreig can be reached at krumreig.2@osu.edu.

Be the first to comment on this article!

Add comment


I am not posting spam. I understand posting spam or other comments that are unrelated to this article will cause my comment to be flagged for deletion and possibly cause my IP address to be permanently banned from this server.

Enter the characters in the image above:

log out