Yesterday a gunman walked in to Otto Miller hall at Seattle Pacific University and opened fire, killing one and injuring two before being tackled and subdued by students and faculty.

As a Computer Science student at SPU, I spent most of my time in Otto Miller hall and have so many great memories there. It’s where I wrote my first recursive function. It’s where I learned about a crazy new technology called XML that was going to change the world (yes, that’s how long ago I was at college). It’s where my advisor handed me a book about a programming language he thought I’d like to learn named Java, which I am still programming with today (thanks to Android).

I remember what it was like to be at SPU, excited about the skills I was learning and where they were going to take me after college. I’m sure that before the incident yesterday many of the students in Otto Miller hall were experiencing similar excitement about their future. My heart aches when I think about the student who was killed that had this future taken away from them.

My thoughts and prayers are with the families of the victims as well as the entire SPU community.