My school is more than our history.
Quick flashback to about a week ago. I was standing in a Catholic church at Charlotte, North Carolina while wearing my typical daily outfit, a Virginia Tech T-shirt. A middle-aged, newly balding man walked up to me, greeting me with the phrase, "I want to talk to you about Virginia Tech!" Obviously, I was more than happy to oblige, and I responded with a chipper, "Yeah, absolu—" The balding man cut me off with, "It's not a good thing." Unsure what to expect went with an uneasy, "...uh OK?" The man continued and asked if I felt safe on campus, so naturally I reassured him that I felt very safe on campus with many great police officers on patrol. It didn't hit me until after I responded that he was referring to my safety on campus in regards to the shooting that happened in 2007. He went on asking a slew of questions about the details of the shooting and my take on all of it. Never once did he ask how our Newman Catholic Community at Virginia Tech was, or about how exciting it is to jump to "Enter Sandman" during our football games, or how I have the opportunity to live out Ut Prosim every day.
Virginia Tech is more than just our history; we are a family, and on April 16th, 2007, although I did not know it yet, I lost 32 members of my family. And students at Virginia Tech take that very seriously.
Although the remembrance of these 32 lives are a substantial part of Virginia Tech and our school history, we are much more than that. We are the students who see the April 16th memorial every day as we walk to class and remember the lives of those 32 Hokies. We are the students who have the opportunity to live out Ut Prosim each and every day, and once a year take even bigger measures and participate in The Big Event. We are the students who raise money and awareness for cancer during the largest collegiate Relay for Life. We are the students who proudly "Wear the Tradition" every day so that everyone who passes us knows we attended the best school in the state. We are Virginia Tech, and in the words of Nikki Giovanni, "We will prevail."
In my opinion, we have prevailed. We became a stronger university after April 16th. We are without a doubt the best school in the state, and I wouldn't want to be anything but a Hokie.
