Educator Leads Civil Engineers Back From Their Day of Hell

Virginia Tech program head Bill Knocke rebuilds bonds for staff and students

William R. Knocke, head of the Charles E. Via Dept. of Civil and Environmental Engineering at Virginia Tech University, was not in the engineering building in which a deranged student gunned down nine of his students and staff on April 16, 2007. But his office directly faced the site of most of the carnage that day on the Blacksburg, Va., campus. He watched helplessly as students jumped from upper floors to escape the gunfire, which ultimately claimed 30 lives in that building and two others elsewhere on campus.

Virginia Tech Faculty and students are honored in a new memorial.

But Knocke was not dumbfounded for long. The crisis demanded a response, and it wasn’t long before he reached out to calm his terrified department and to even emerge as a spokesman on national  television to try to explain the unthinkable. Nine months later, Knocke, with the help of students and staff, is rebuilding his department and refocusing its attention on the business of education.

Multimedia  View Award of Excellence Luncheon and Acceptance Speech of William R. Knocke  April 3, 2008

Knocke says no students on campus that day have left the department nor have others rescinded acceptances. Students and staff actually appreciated having final exams for the first time in a year. But “the event is not behind us by any means,” he says. “We are reminded daily, in one way or another, of what took place on April 16.”

Randy Dymond, a department professor, commends Knocke’s handling of the crisis and of current plans to honor those lost, including G.V. Loganathan, killed teaching class. A department committee is now planning a tribute to the veteran teacher, including a memorial library and lecture series named for him.