When people find out I graduated from Penn State, the first question is always about Joe Paterno or the football program.
Until last weekend, those questions were easy to answer.
Now, like the nearly 500,000 other Penn State graduates in this country, I’m trying to make sense of this horrific story that has shattered everything we all believed about our university.
Unlike most Penn Staters, my feelings about the college have never been tied to the football team. I attended games while I was in school but never fell in love with the program like so many.
When people gave me the “We are …” chant, I usually responded with a blank stare.
But I always had a tremendous amount of pride in my school. Penn State always felt like a special place — a different place. My profession has allowed me to visit many great college towns, but none of them felt like State College.
It felt like your hometown after you lived there for just a short time. The school is large, but the town always felt small. That town will never feel the same.
If these charges are proven true, Jerry Sandusky destroyed lives there. Those who knew a predator was on campus, including Joe Paterno, did not do enough to stop him. Paterno has always stood for something more than just the football program. Love him or hate him, everyone respected him.
Now, his time at Penn State has ended ignominiously.
The portion of the grand jury report detailing graduate assistant Mike McQueary going to Paterno to report what he saw occurring in the shower room of the football offices is gut-wrenching. The idea of this 10-year-old boy, identified as “Victim 2,” in the report being raped and none of the men who found out trying to reach his parents is incomprehensible.
Staring at the diploma on my wall, I can’t come to grips that this happened at a place that always felt pure. Now, it’s beyond sullied. The taint of this will not go away until everyone involved is punished. Those who broke the law need to be punished. The Board of Trustees took the first step toward healing by firing Paterno and removing school president Graham Spanier last night.
Next, the game this week with Nebraska should be forfeited. How can 100,000 people go to Beaver Stadium this weekend to cheer for Penn State? This is bigger than football.
No price can be placed on what Sandusky stole from those kids. Nothing can be done to fix this. But it’s time for someone at Penn State to show some remorse.
It is clear now that Penn State either did not grasp or refused to accept just what it was dealing with. It is time for it to show it gets it. It is time for it to show Penn State is a shred of what we thought it was.
Maybe one day I’ll be proud of being an alum again. Right now, I just hope no one asks me where I went to college.
We are … ashamed.