Large cards were placed in the Steinert Campus Center lobby and lounge beginning April 25 for students, faculty and staff to sign.
The homemade cards include photographs of those killed, information about the victims gathered from news media and other sources and messages to their loved ones. They will be sent to the university.
"We are taught to look beyond ourselves and to help others," said Dawn Adams, the junior business administration major from Fresno who organized the effort with several other students. "The greatest reason for this project is feeling helpless and feeling a need to do something, to do anything to reach out to the families of these victims."
The students' empathy does not stop with those killed by another. The 35th card is to the shooter's family and written in Korean, their native language. "Mental illness is not something rational or reasonable," Adams said.
This subject is emotional for Adams because she has a child of her own. "My biggest fear as a parent is getting a call that something has happened to my child. I can't imagine their pain nor would I ever want to," she said.