Serving to help Tech's healing

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ROANOKE — Virginia Tech"s main lawn has been a focal point for grief over the 32 persons slain by a student gunman in April, but university officials hope an event in the shooting victims" honor today will give the mourning a positive resonance around the world.

Representatives of nonprofit organizations in the Blacksburg area signed up for spots on the campus lawn to take commitments by students, faculty and staff for community-service projects. This will be the kickoff of VT-Engage, an initiative with a goal of 600,000 hours of service to honor those killed and injured April 16 by Seung-hui Cho, who took his own life.

The project is especially fitting because many of the shooting victims were involved in service projects, said John Dooley, vice provost for outreach and international affairs.

Mr. Dooley said yesterday that the response to the proposal has been much greater than expected. The school initially wanted 300,000 hours of service — 10 from each student, faculty and staff member. But alumni said they would match that goal.

Officials had hoped 60 to 80 organizations would participate in the kickoff, but more than 100 have pledged to do so.

"We believe this whole process is a meaningful way for us to find pathways to healing in a sensitive way to remember those that were lost and were injured," Mr. Dooley said.

The idea for the service commitment, he said, grew out of a meeting during the summer with Bryan and Renee Cloyd, whose daughter Austin was among the 27 students killed. The Cloyds were inquiring about ways Virginia Tech could be involved with Appalachia Service Project, for which Austin spent four summers as a volunteer.

Mr. Cloyd, a Virginia Tech accounting professor, said he will man a table today to sign up volunteers to help repair houses for the poor in southwestern Virginia. But he said 60 of the 98 students needed for the project already had signed up.

"We started recruiting as soon as school started," he said.

Mr. Cloyd said organizing the service project has helped him and his wife cope with their loss.

Even before the shootings, university officials had planned to call on students and staff for a greater service commitment to honor Virginia Tech"s motto: Ut Prosim (That I may serve).

The VT-Engage kickoff will be held simultaneously in Blacksburg and at Tech centers in Abingdon, Roanoke, Northern Virginia and Richmond.

Mr. Dooley said officials hope students who are studying in other countries will perform service abroad, and he himself plans to fulfill some of his commitment during a business trip to India next month.

So far, the project has received pledges of help from two other schools — Boston College"s athletics department and Southwest Virginia Community College. But more may follow. University President Charles W. Steger asked for support in a letter that was to appear in an advertisement today in the Chronicle of Higher Education.