In the aftermath of the shooting on UNC-Chapel Hill's campus, the university's faculty are processing the trauma of losing one of their own.
Zijie Yan, an assistant professor in the department of applied physical sciences, was killed on Monday and one of his graduate students, Tailei Qi, has been charged with first-degree murder. That day, a campus lockdown kept thousands of faculty, staff and students sheltered in place for about three hours.
The university's new faculty chair Beth Moracco, associate professor in the department of health behavior and associate director of the UNC Injury Prevention Research Center, spoke with WUNC's Liz Schlemmer about her experience. She recalled sitting in a departmental meeting on campus when the lockdown started.
NOTE: This transcript has been edited for brevity and clarity.
"We were just finishing up when the alert started pinging on people's phones and we heard the sirens."
What did you do for the next three hours?
"We locked our doors, pulled the shades down, turned the lights off, sat away from the windows, and waited to get further advice and updates on the situation. The first alert that came out said that there was a person who was armed and dangerous on or near campus."
Where were you getting other information?
"I was getting information from family members and friends and colleagues and my son who was actually on campus, through social media. There was a lot of information and misinformation flying around at the time."
And your son's a student?
"Yes, he's a graduate student."
What was that like to be on lockdown and know that your child is too?
"It was surreal. It really was, because we were checking in on each other to make sure that the other was safe, to see if the other was even on campus that day, and where we were, how we were doing, how the people around us were doing. It was really surreal and just horrible situation to be in."
How did you know what to do?
"We had gotten a message at the beginning of the semester about several different opportunities to attend active shooter trainings. One of my colleagues had just gone through the active shooter training. And so, we were sharing information with each other."
Some of what I've heard is that it was a lot of people sitting in the dark, literally...
"Yeah, it was really disquieting and uncomfortable, not to know how much longer we would be in this situation, what was happening. And I think there was a sense of fear and uncertainty for a long time, and it's just sitting with that is, is very difficult."
This wasn't a mass shooting. The UNC chief of police said that it appears that the suspect went straight to [Caudill Labs] and then left, but that they did know each other. They were in the same department. What are professors reflecting on now that you know what happened?
"Yeah, there's a deep, deep sense of sorrow, and a sense that something really precious to us has been shattered. Our classrooms and our labs, and our relationship with students and being on campus brings us a sense of joy. And this is what we do, this is our life's work. And to have it threatened like that and to lose a colleague. In this situation, it's really devastating.
"We're kind of sorting through that, our own feelings of fear and uncertainty, wanting to know and wanting to best support our students and our mentees and our colleagues and the staff members that we work with. And navigating all of that, at the same time, can feel very, very overwhelming. I'm hearing that from a lot of my colleagues."
Within a week, faculty and students are going to be in the exact same place, with the same people they were with on Monday. How are faculty planning for that?
"It's going to be really important to incorporate trauma-informed pedagogy and trauma-informed approaches into returning to the classroom. So, holding space for students to talk about what happened, to acknowledge what happened, to check in with students about how they feel most comfortable interacting.
"As faculty, we're dealing with similar emotions and feelings as we're going back. And we have to be strong and supportive for our students, as well. And so, I think that's going to be...it's going to be challenging."
UNC-Chapel Hill is offering this week support sessions for faculty, and resources for counseling and returning to the classroom.
