 "Photo: Courtesy of The Northern Star, Jim Killarm")
 "Photo: Courtesy of The Northern Star, Jim Killarm")
Five students were killed in a North Illinois University lecture hall on Thursday after a former student entered the hall and opened fire on approximately 150 students. The shooter then killed himself in the hall after shooting more than 20 people.
Thursday's shooting in DeKalb, Ill., marks the most recent major shooting on a U.S. college campus. The shooting at Virginia Technical Institute and State University in Blacksburg, Va., in April 2007, was the deadliest in U.S. history.
The gunman, identified as Steven P. Kazmierczak, entered a geography class at around 3 p.m., CST, in Cole Hall on the NIU campus and opened fire. Kazmierczak fired more than 30 shots before reloading his weapon and turning it on himself. He fired approximately 48 shots.
NIU officials locked down campus minutes after the attack and by 3:20 p.m., a campus-wide alert was sent to students and faculty, informing them to stay where they were.
In a televised press conference, NIU police chief Donald Grady said Kazmierczak was respected by NIU staff, faculty members and other students. Kazmierczak graduated from NIU in 2006 with an undergraduate degree in sociology before moving onto the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign for graduate work.
Grady said there were no previous indications Kazmierczak would engage in activity like this.
Two of the four weapons carried by the gunman were legally purchased, according to CNN.com. Kazmierczak entered the lecture hall with a shotgun and three pistols. The pistols were hidden on his body as he carried his shotgun in a guitar case.
Four victims died at the scene, including the shooter, while two died after at a local hospital. Kishwaukee Community Hospital, located in DeKalb, treated more than 15 victims, most with gunshot wounds to the head or chest.
President George W. Bush asked Americans to "offer their blessings - blessings of comfort and blessings of strength," to the community at NIU, according to CNN.
Hillary Kowalski, a junior at NIU, said she was not on campus when the shooting occurred but after receiving a call from a friend, she decided to go to campus. She said campus was chaotic, as information and rumors were spreading about the shooting.
Kowalski said students were unaware if there was another gunman or if the gunman was actually dead. Additionally, some people did not even know a shooting had occurred.
"We didn't know what was going on," she said. "I remember seeing some people were running and panicking and crying and some people just walking by because not everybody knew it."
Panic has been subdued but there is still a sense of fear throughout campus, Kowalski said. Some students went home the day of the shooting and have remained home, while others have been going back and forth to attend vigils and be close to others on campus.
"Right now it's a mix of emotion," she said. "There's the fear and the sense of loss and the sense of what should I do. And of course, there's sadness."
Kowalski said classes and sporting events have been cancelled for the entire week, and the only people returning to campus are the staff, who returned to work today. She said she knows students who would be disturbed if classes resumed anytime before next week.
"People need their time for mourning and grieving," Kowalski said. "People need to collect their thoughts and get themselves together. I think this time is really good for all of us.
"Some students, they need to be here."
John Brennan, the director of public relations for the University of Delaware, said the university has not issued a public statement about the NIU shooting.
However, university President Patrick Harker did contact NIU President John Peters after the shooting, Brennan said.
"President Harker sent a letter to the NIU president, but we didn't issue any other statement than that," Brennan said.
Amanda Walde, a NIU sophomore, said she received a phone call from a friend to inform her of the shooter.
Walde said she went to campus and offered rides to other students because the NIU bus system was shut down.
She said she felt like one of the first people to find out about the shooting. Campus was chaotic and people were confused as television networks had yet to pick up on the story.
Campus, filled with police activity, was congested and students had trouble calling others, Walde said. Rumors about the shooter and how many people were involved spread throughout campus, as no one knew exactly what had happened.
"No one really knew for sure. Nobody really had accurate information," she said. "Everyone was just really confused to begin with.
Aleksey Zozulya, a junior at the University of Delaware, said when he first heard of the NIU shootings, he could not believe shootings on college campuses were becoming such a common experience. After the shootings at V-Tech and Delaware State University, he said he wondered why people would still continue to do this.
Zozulya said while free and open access to lecture halls is convenient, he thinks it is odd that anyone can walk into lecture halls. With building security being so important, he said access cards could be the next step if people are getting hurt.
"We have them for housing, why not have them for lecture halls?" he said.
Brenna Schadegg, a junior at the university, said she feels safe on campus, but incidents like this can happen anywhere.
Schadegg said she signed up to receive e-mail and text messages from the university, but has yet to get one.
She said she commends the university for being proactive in its approach for campus safety instead of waiting until something happens here.
"At least they're seeing what happens at other places and trying to adjust the system as much as possible," Schadegg said. "That's all you can really do and hope it works."
Jenny Francl, a graduate student and residence hall director on campus, said one of her biggest concerns is the idea of a "copy-cat" killer. Francl said she has no idea how she would handle a situation like that on this campus.
"It scares me knowing that there is a possibility [of] having to deal with that kind of an issue," she said.
Francl, who is originally from Wisconsin, said she thinks the media overplayed the mistakes at V-Tech, but the NIU coverage was respectful and tastefully done. Additionally, she was glad the media did not sensationalize the shooting.
"I'm actually kind of glad the media didn't play it up because of the copy-cat idea," she said.
Walde said she collected herself before attempting to help others, but campus was still stricken with fear.
"It was just a very, very scary moment," she said.
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