STATE COLLEGE, Pa. — What started as a conversation in a Tuesday morning public relations class for Kyle Harris and Jess Sever has turned into a Friday night candlelight vigil expected to draw nearly 10,000 people to Penn State’s Old Main Lawn.

‘We kind of just came in on Tuesday morning outraged about all this negative coverage that Penn State is getting and how none of the focus is on the victims,’ Sever said. ‘We just started going back and forth and we just came up with this idea, ‘Well, why don’t we put the focus back on the individuals, get some positive light onto Penn State’s community and do this?’ And we kind of just ran with it from there.’

Harris and Sever, both senior public relations majors, registered the vigil with the university after class at about 11 a.m. on Tuesday. From there, they created a Facebook event and a Twitter account to generate interest.

The vigil, dubbed the ‘Candle Light Vigil for Abused Victims,’ will be held from 9:30 to 10:30 p.m. Friday on the Old Main Lawn. More than 8,900 people were listed as attending on the vigil’s Facebook page as of 2 p.m. Friday. But both Harris and Sever anticipate that number to grow to about 10,000 in-person participants tonight.

Sever said that although she doesn’t expect all the students on the Facebook page to attend, she believes people within the community will come out and support the victims of the tragedy.

Joe Paterno, head football coach of the Nittany Lions, and Penn State President Graham Spanier were removed on Wednesday night in light of a sexual abuse scandal involving retired assistant coach Jerry Sandusky. Paterno and Spanier were fired four days after a grand jury report charged Sandusky with a series of sexual assaults involving eight young boys, including one he allegedly raped in Penn State’s football facility shower.

At about 11 a.m. on Friday at Old Main, a building completed in 1863, six students did a ‘slow walk’ in front of the stairs leading up to Old Main. The slow walk was done to tell students to slow down and realize that this tragedy is about the victims, not Joe Paterno and other high-ranking former university officials.

‘And don’t hold people as scapegoats, hold people accountable,’ said Mike Matauic, a senior political science major, about how the investigation should move forward. Matauic led the six students through the slow walk.

Matauic said the students decided to do the slow walk in front of Old Main because of Peter Buckland, a 35-year-old doctoral student in the College of Education voicing his opinion on the steps of Old Main. Buckland, who has been protesting for three days and will be at Old Main from about 8:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. Friday, held a sign that read ‘Justice, Healing, Caring,’ which resonated with the students who did the slow walk.  

But the scene of Old Main Lawn will change Friday night from small showings to a large gathering when thousands of students come out in support of the victims.

Harris said Old Main was selected as the location of the vigil because it’s one of the places on campus where students can freely assemble at any time. It’s also an iconic building of Penn State, which has attracted a lot of negative attention this week.

‘We feel that holding something positive for the victims will really bring some positivity to their lives, as well as the PSU students and the university,’ Harris said. 

Co-organizer Sever said the university has done a poor job handling the scandal, as Penn State students haven’t been advised on how to move forward.

She said: ‘We have been kind of been just floating around and don’t know what to do or where to turn and that’s why Kyle and I just wanted to give an outlet to students to express how they feel in a positive manner.’

jdharr04@syr.edu

Published on November 10, 2011 at 12:00 pm

Contact Jon: jdharr04@syr.edu