NIU has announced the creation of a new office to provide long-term assistance to those most affected by the Feb. 14 shootings in Cole Hall.
The Office of Support and Advocacy will serve as a centralized resource for all students, faculty and staff who were in Cole Hall at the time of the tragedy. The office also will serve as a point of contact for families of deceased students.
“The campus community as a whole has a tremendous amount of healing to do,” NIU Provost Ray Alden said. “However, those who were in Cole Hall that day may have particular needs, and this office is intended to ensure that they are provided with the utmost support.”
The office will provide assistance for as long as needed, said NIU Vice President of Student Affairs Brian O. Hemphill.
“We know from speaking to colleagues at Virginia Tech and other schools that have experienced tragedies of this magnitude that events like these can cause emotional trauma on campus long after the event, and this office will help those individuals cope with those issues,” Hemphill said.
In most instances, the office will not be the direct provider of services. Instead, it will act as a clearinghouse, helping to identify the services students need and assisting them in establishing connections with the correct providers.
“We will be a place where students directly touched by this tragedy can come for help with all sorts of issues,” said Scott Peska, who was selected by Hemphill to lead the office. “It will be our job to determine who can best help them and to see that the assistance is delivered.”
In the near future, those needs might include helping injured students secure classroom adaptations that make it easier for them to attend class as they recuperate from injuries, or linking them with tutors or other academic support. In the more distant future, the office might assist students in creating or finding support groups or securing private counseling services.
“We can’t really say what everyone’s needs might be, but we do know that they will change over time, so we will do our best to evolve along with them,” said Peska, who believes the links he has established across campus as director of the First-Year Connections program will be useful in correctly directing students.
Assisting Peska in those efforts will be a staff of five: an assistant director in charge of counseling services (that individual will be a licensed psychologist), an assistant director in charge of programs and support, a victims’ assistance advocate, a secretary and a graduate assistant.
In addition to working with affected students, faculty, staff and families, the office also will assist in the collection and archiving of material related to the event; participate in discussions regarding creation of a memorial; and serve as a point of contact for groups or individuals wishing to do fundraising relating to Feb. 14. The office also will help plan any commemorative events.
Other universities that have been through tragedies similar in scale have found such offices very useful.
At Virginia Tech, where April 16 will mark the first anniversary of a shooting spree that took 32 lives, the Office of Recovery and Support has played a role similar to what is envisioned for the OSA.
That office has done everything from organizing regular dinners for students injured or traumatized by the shootings and working with faculty to make classrooms less traumatizing to monitoring the emotional wellbeing of faculty and staff directly affected by the shootings. The office also is helping to plan the memorial services and activities that will mark the first anniversary of the tragedy.
Officials at VT believe that the demands on the office will diminish over time. However, administrators at Texas A&M University have found that their Office of Student Assistance remains useful nine years after the tragedy that helped lead to its creation.
In the aftermath of the bonfire collapse that killed 12 students at TAMU in the spring of 1999, the university discovered that many different departments on campus were duplicating efforts and that it was often difficult for students to locate the services they needed.
This led to the eventual creation of The Office of Student Assistance, which operates much as OSA is expected to function. However, as students directly touched by that tragedy graduated or left campus, the office remained in operation, continuing in its role as a clearinghouse for students in need of services, but opening its doors to the entire campus community.
“For us, it’s become a place where people can come for any type of assistance, and we will help them sort things out,” said TAMU Dean of Student Life Dave Parrott.
NIU’s Office of Support and Advocacy will open for business Thursday, April 3. It is located in Gilbert Hall, Room B123, and can be reached by calling (815) 753-0490.
NIU Vice President for University Advancement Michael P. Malone, who has been named chair of the February 14th Memorial Committee, is soliciting suggestions for the creation of a permanent physical memorial to honor the victims of the tragic events of last month.
Members of the NIU community are encouraged to send their suggestions to memorial@niu.edu.
“The university’s ultimate goal is to create a fitting memorial – a special place where people can gather to reflect upon and honor the memory of the victims and to reaffirm the core values of NIU,” Malone said.
The committee will be made up of faculty, staff, students, alumni, annuitants, community members, friends and supporters of NIU. Additionally, the newly created NIU Office of Support and Advocacy will seek important input on the memorial from families of the deceased and from students who were physically injured in the incident. Representatives from this office will be a part of the Memorial Committee to provide this valuable perspective.
“We will review all submitted suggestions, examining their merits and looking for common themes that emerge,” Malone said. “In addition to looking at different types of suggested memorials, we also will examine the merits of potential sites on campus for such a memorial space.”
He said it is important to note that while the advisory Memorial Committee will provide recommendations for development of a memorial, it is not examining issues related to Cole Hall.
“This is about the creation of a memorial, not about the future of Cole Hall,” Malone said. “These are separate issues.”
Student government is working on the Cole Hall issue, gathering opinions and discussing options. Provost Ray Alden and Paul Stoddard, executive secretary of the University Council, are likewise assessing campus views on immediate, mid-range and long-term space needs related to the closure of Cole Hall. (More information on Cole Hall efforts is available at www.niu.edu/president/messages/march17.shtml.)
NIU has established a Memorial Center in remembrance of the students, families and community members affected by the tragic events of Feb. 14.
The Memorial Center, located in Altgeld Hall, Room 125, has been established until a permanent memorial can be developed. The space will provide students, staff, faculty, family and friends a place to remember and reflect.
Visitors will be able to view a video of the Feb. 24 memorial service and photo displays from other vigils and memorials. They will also have the opportunity to share their thoughts in a memorial journal.
The Memorial Center will be open from 2 to 5 p.m. Mondays and Wednesdays, from 1 to 5 p.m. Tuesdays and Thursdays and from 8 a.m. to 2 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays.
NIU’s baseball team will face Notre Dame in a 7 p.m. Wednesday, April 16, contest at U.S. Cellular Field, home of the Chicago White Sox. Tickets are on sale.
Proceeds from tickets sales will benefit NIU’s February 14 Student Scholarship Fund. The Huskies and Fighting Irish last met on the diamond in 2005.
“It is an incredible show of support from the Chicago White Sox and from [head coach] Dave Schrage and the University of Notre Dame to be able to do this,” NIU head coach Ed Mathey said. “To have the ability to put together an event like this at an amazing facility like U.S. Cellular Field to generate financial support for the scholarship fund is tremendous.”
All tickets are $10 for lower-level reserved seating and are available at whitesox.com, Ticketmaster phone lines, Chicagoland Ticketmaster outlets, the NIU campus box office and the U.S. Cellular Field box office.
Gates to the ballpark will open at 6 p.m. Parking is free in Lots A (bus parking), B and C, and concession stands will be open during the game.
“We look forward to a great contest on the field and hope that all the NIU alumni and fans in the Chicago area will come out to support this endeavor,” Mathey said. “Because the proceeds for this event are going to the February 14 Student Scholarship Fund, I would certainly like to see this become one of the highest-attended college games in the Midwest this season.”
“The White Sox are honored to host Northern Illinois and Notre Dame at U.S. Cellular Field for this special game and important cause,” said Brooks Boyer, White Sox chief marketing officer and vice president. “Both schools boast a significant fan base in Chicago that will make for a great night of baseball while serving a much more important cause.”
George D. Kuh, chancellor’s professor of higher education and former director of the Center for Postsecondary Research at Indiana University, Bloomington, will present “What Matters to Student Success: Lessons for NIU” from 1:30 to 3:30 p.m. today. The event will take place at the Barsema Alumni and Visitors Center ballroom. A reception will follow.
Kuh is a nationally renowned researcher focusing on the assessment of undergraduate student learning and personal development, campus cultures and the institutional conditions that foster student learning. He is the author of 21 books and hundreds of publications on many aspects of higher education and the student experience. He also is the founder of the National Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE) and related surveys.
For more information, contact the ACCESS office at (815) 753-1141. This event is sponsored by the Office of the Provost.
The First-Year Composition Program is sponsoring a forum for NIU students to share their writing publicly.
The Showcase of Student Writing will be held from 3 to 4:30 p.m. today in the Holmes Student Center Regency Room.
“In the spirit of moving ‘forward, together forward,’ we are hoping that many students and members of the NIU community and the DeKalb community will join us in supporting and celebrating the excellent academic writing that our students participate in,” said Kathleen Turner, a teaching assistant and member of the First-Year Composition Committee.
Students will display projects created in their courses taught by first-year composition instructors. The projects include aspects of visual rhetoric ranging from PowerPoint presentations, posters and brochures to debates and skits.
The ReadNex Poetry Squad, four spoken-word poets and emcees from New York City, will come to NIU at 7:30 p.m. Monday, March 31, in the A/B Formal Lounge of the Grant South Complex.
Squad members will give a spoken word performance with the purpose to uplift urban communities using hip-hop, soul, Latin and Caribbean music. Afterward, they will host an open mic event.
Call (815) 753-1555 for more information.
After 15 years as a neo-Nazi white supremacist activist and recruiter, Tom “TJ” Leyden experienced a profound change of heart, turned away from hate and began teaching tolerance.
Leyden will visit campus at 7 p.m. Tuesday, April 1, to speak on “Turning Away from Hate.” The free speech takes place in the Carl Sandburg Auditorium of the Holmes Student Center.
Call (815) 753-1963 for more information.
All University Women’s Club members, spouses and guests are invited to attend the annual potluck supper to be held from 6 to 9 p.m. Tuesday, April 1, at the Ellwood House Visitor Center in DeKalb.
Bring a dish to share and your own table service. Donna Peterson of Sycamore’s Chapel in the Pines will entertain with “The Bride Wore Duct Tape.”
For details, contact Mary Lu Strack at (815) 756-4390 or strackfolk@tbcnet.com.