It was a bright clear Las Vegas day. The trees on campus were dropping leaves of gold and red as cool temperatures had finally arrived in the desert. As one would expect during finals week, students were walking along the Academic Mall. But on this day, they were all converging at the same campus spot. And instead of backpacks, they carried flowers and white vigil candles. 

Exactly one week earlier, on Dec. 6, a gunman had entered Beam Hall and killed three cherished professors while seriously injuring another. It brought a sudden, chaotic, and traumatic end to the fall semester and left the campus and its entire community in mourning.

Now more than 1,000 students, faculty, and staff were returning to campus, many for the first time since they abruptly evacuated their classrooms and offices. They gathered near the Lee Pascal Rose Garden for a vigil to honor Jerry Cha-Jan Chang, Patricia Navarro Velez, and Naoko Takemaru.

Seeking a better view, some attendees found a spot in front of Carson Education Building. A berm there lifts up a weeping mulberry, affectionately called the Snuffleupagus Tree. Much like the namesake Sesame Street character, it offers its trunk for strength and its leaves weep with us.

Others chose the steps that rise up toward The Flashlight, a sculpture envisioned by its famous creators to be a “beacon in the night.” To find our way out of darkness, it reminds, we need to gather with each other.

In opening the vigil, President Keith E. Whitfield said, “Perhaps like me, you are feeling that your sense of home and your sense of security has been upended. But what has struck me — as we painfully tried to move through the worst day in the history of our university and the worst day in our lives for many of us — is how this moment of darkness revealed the brightness in our friends, in our colleagues, and the strength of togetherness of our UNLV community.”

Patricia Charlton, NSHE chancellor and a UNLV alumna, said, “Our hearts hurt. Our hearts are empty. I hope we can support one another as the days, the weeks, the years ahead will be difficult.” But she urged the campus to carry on the professors’ legacy of teaching and service. “They truly are the best of us.”

The Legacy of Patricia Navarro Velez, Professor of Accounting

Navarro Velez was memorialized by lecturer Gloribert Roque-Melendez, who found a kindred soul in her accounting systems colleague and fellow Puerto Rican.

“Pat had many, many plans,” Roque-Melendez said. Plans to ensure her students were exposed to the technologies emerging in the workplace. And plans to gather her work friends with her family around her home-cooked meals. “There is a hole in our hearts that we know will not go away per se because we will never forget her, we will, however, become stronger together." 

Lee Business School student Johnny Trujillo had grown close to Navarro Velez when she started serving as the faculty advisor to an organization he launched for students in information security. It gave him an opportunity to be mentored for the transition from student to professional.

“I looked forward to soon calling her my colleague, my peer, my friend when I graduated this year. But we will not waver. Our perseverance is reinforced by her loss.”

More: Patricia Navarro Velez Remembered for her 'Larger-Than-Life' Personality

The Legacy of Jerry Cha-Jan Chang, Professor of Information Systems

Hans Rawhouser, an associate professor, was one of the many young faculty in the Lee Business School who found mentorship from Chang. He described how the seasoned professor delivered his observations on departmental politics with no wasted words and often a chuckle. 

“Influencing requires sharing,” Rawhouser said. “Jerry shared authentically about what he cared about in an ego-free way. … Jerry focused on what was most important to him and achieved much as a result. His subtle and quiet way of sharing about his life influenced me and many others. While his influence will live on, we will miss him.”

Ashley Weckesser, both an alumna and current UNLV employee, gained confidence from Chang as she started her master’s program in information systems.

“As a young woman, with a liberal arts background [who was now] in a business, graduate-level program, his support was invaluable,” to her and her fellow graduate assistants. “His dedication to sparking our curiosity as students and supporting our individual journeys as spouses and parents helped make our transformation from sleep-deprived graduate students to industry professionals possible."

More: Jerry Cha-Jan Chang Balanced His Two Devotions: Work and Family

The Legacy of Naoko Takemaru, Professor of Japanese Studies

Takemaru was fondly remembered for her thoughtful tokens of support for colleagues and her open door for students, said Deborah Arteaga, a world languages and cultures professor. 

“Because of her modest and unassuming manner, many people do not know of Naoko’s cutting-edge research. It is not an exaggeration to say that she was born a socio-linguist.”

She went on to tell a story of Naoko, who, as a child, questioned why Japanese children’s stories always cast ogre-villains as women. That observation would lead to her ground-breaking book, Women in the Language and Society of Japan.

Alumnus Devon Whitaker held that book as he began to speak. “We knew her as Takemaru-sensei,” he said, going on to add, “She helped boost my spirits up to the point where I started to believe in myself more and more each and every single day. That drive and that passion she instilled in me is priceless. She taught me to take the ‘t’ out of the word can’t, and you have can.”

After they both lay a wreath beneath a photo of a Takemaru, Whitaker bowed one last time in a sign of respect for his smiling sensei.

More: A Sensei They'll Always Cherish, Naoko Takemaru

Closing With Hope

Musical interludes provided by the UNLV College of Fine Arts included a trombone solo, “The Lord’s Prayer,” by Isrea L. Butler, director of the School of Music. Tim Jones, a percussionist and vice dean of the college, struck the bells three times at the end of a moment of silence. 

Christian Shelton, a senior vocal performance major, brought many to tears in closing with his rendition of “Rise Up” by Andra Day. 

“All we need is hope,” his tenor voice crescendoed. “And for that, we have each other.”