Students leave campus for home
Charles R. Barrineau, CT Reporter
April 18, 2007
With Virginia Tech President Charles Steger cancelling classes until Monday, April 23, many of the approximately 9,000 on-campus residents in Blacksburg are heading home.
Many who are heading home are doing so for similar reasons.
"It's kind of weird being on campus right now," said Jade Worobec, a freshman West Ambler-Johnston Hall resident. "Walking around and still seeing press and police everywhere is kind of off-and walking by the fourth floor is kind of eerie."
Some West-Ambler Johnston residents had already left to go home Monday.
"It was nice and my parents were glad that I was home," said Emily Foster, a freshman fourth-floor, resident. "They were pretty freaked out by the whole thing, so it was nice to be able to see them and be with my friends."
Foster and her fellow Roanoke resident Devon McCarty, a freshman and fifth-floor West Ambler-Johnston Hall resident also went home Monday. She was thankful to be able to do so.
"I think it's a nice thing," McCarty said. "When something like this happens, I always have (home) to be able to go back to whenever I want. And other people-it's a lot harder to drive four hours to be somewhere to be more comfortable."
Students hope time away from campus, with family and friends, will leave them rejuvenated and with a fresh perspective.
"I think it will be hard coming back, but a week will definitely help I hope," Foster said. "It won't be easy."
A third freshman Francesca Narro also living in West Ambler-Johnston Hall echoed Foster's sentiments, although she feels different not being directly connected to the tragedy.
"I'm not technically grieving anybody that I personally know," Narro said. "I guess I'm just going to come back and get used to the adjustment of what happened on campus."