After taking a couple days to think about what the Virginia Tech shooting means, I, like many other college students, am still shocked and taken aback by what happened in Blacksburg.

It seems as though everyone has been affected by the tragedy, by varying degrees of separation. After carnage of this magnitude, it is hard not to have been affected.

The happenings in Virginia hit incredibly close to home for college students. They represented a violent incursion into the bubble of safety we expect college to be. Many of us arrive on campus and, for better or for worse, expect it to be a place of safety, comfort, and joviality. We do not want to have to live under the fear of the gun, having to wonder whether the classroom or dormitory will become a labyrinth of demise.

The campus is a safe zone for many of us. So this story is especially jarring for us students, as well as parents nationwide who have the same expectations for the safety of college campuses.

It is hard to imagine words to express the state of shock that America’s college have experienced. Facebook tributes have made their way throughout the web, but those seem trite compared to the carnage that has taken place. Simply, our thoughts and prayers, and the hope that it will never happen again are all we can muster.