Updated at 2:15 pm
It’s the third anniversary of the shooting that killed three Michigan State University students — Arielle Anderson, Brian Fraser and Alexandria Verner — and injured five others.
Alongside multiple campus-hosted events taking place throughout the day, the student body is taking the time to memorialize the tragedy.
Bouquets of fresh flowers cover the feet of the Spartan statue outside Spartan Stadium, left by students paying their respects.
Bella Short is one of the students who brought flowers to Sparty this morning. She said that, for her, today is about appreciating the people you have in your life.
“I'm just gonna hang out with some close friends today,” Short said. “And I called my mom and told her I loved her.”
Students who were freshmen in the 2022-23 academic year, making this the last year that any MSU students on a four-year track were in attendance at the time of the shooting.
Short was a freshman in 2023.
“My friend and I were talking about how our freshman year there were flowers covered, like you would not be able to walk up behind the steps,” she said, talking about the Spartan statue. “And there's not a lot today, which you know that means that there's a lot of people who weren't here for it, or just aren't thinking about it, but it's just something that I'll never forget.”
Short said that she thinks the student body is healing, and she credits that partially to the campus community.
MSU Student Body President Kathryn Harding agrees that the campus community is healing with time.
“Being a part of the community, coming together year after year, and showing resilience and showing care for one another has been really important for my own healing journey,” she said.
Harding was also a freshman at the time of the shooting, and she said it’s been strange to have fewer students sharing the experience as classes graduate.
“The scale has changed, but the intent has stayed consistent,” she said.
Harding said she thinks community memorials and events honoring the lives lost will continue for years to come.
One such event, Caring Through Service, happened for the third time today.
Renee Miller Zientek is the executive director of the Center for Community Engaged Learning, which hosts Caring Through Service.
She said the goal of the event was to encourage individual healing by healing the community.
“I think it's also been very healing for students and faculty and staff who had a shared experience, albeit not a positive one, to be able to be together on days like this,” Miller Zientek said.
Community members at the Caring Through Service event put together cold weather kits for Community Mental Health Authority of Clinton, Eaton and Ingham Counties to hand out.
They also constructed mental wellbeing kits, which Miller Zientek said will be handed out at counseling sessions on campus.
“We did this last year, too, and we heard back from both of these organizations that these items were really helpful for the folks that they're interacting with and that come to visit them,” she said.
Miller Zientek said she is unsure of the future of Caring Through Service, but that it will continue as long as it’s needed.
“There are still folks on campus that were here when the incident happened, there are still people that are still trying to heal from that,” she said, “and so in honor and in memory of the students that we lost and the students that were hurt, it's just important for us to create this community space for people.”
This story will be updated throughout the day.
Campus Events
- 12-3:30 p.m.: Indoor support spaces — Breslin Center’s Hall of History (1-3 p.m.) and MSU Alumni Chapel (12:30-3:30 p.m.), both staffed with volunteers for resources and support. Keyboard students from the College of Music perform on the Red Cedar Organ in the chapel (sponsored by organist Hae Won Jang).
- 1-3 p.m.: Service and advocacy “Caring Through Service" in Breslin Center Hall of History, hosted by the Center for Community Engaged Learning. Participants build community, support mental health initiatives, make connections, and give back, with food available.
- 4-8 p.m.: Resource and support tent — Heated tent at West Circle Drive and East Circle Drive corner (near Grand River Ramp). Staffed volunteers offer navigation help, bottled water, hot cocoa, luminary kits (white paper bags with green electric tea lights for later use) and QR codes for support resources.
- 8:10-8:30 p.m.: Beaumont Tower remembrance — Music, moment of silence and bell ringing at Beaumont Tower. Beaumont Tower, MSU Union and Berkey Hall light green from dusk Friday to dawn Saturday. Livestream starts at 8 p.m. on spartanstogether.msu.edu (near top of "Plans for Feb. 13, 2026" page).
