The university will ring the U.S.S. Arizona bell three times tomorrow at 8:30 a.m. to remember the lives of the three College of Nursing professors killed by a former student two years ago.

On Oct. 28, 2002, nursing student Robert S. Flores Jr. opened fire in the college, killing professor Robin E. Rogers in her office, and professors Cheryl McGaffic and Barbara Monroe in a classroom full of students taking a midterm. Flores, who was upset over a failing grade, then shot and killed himself in the same room.

The U.S.S. Arizona bell, in the clock tower in the Student Union Memorial Center, is rung for special occasions to honor individuals important to the UA.

Ki Moore, a professor in the College of Nursing and the director of the Division of Nursing Practice, said the bell also rang last year on the first anniversary of the shooting.

"This is a way across the university we can recognize Barbara, Robin and Cheryl," Moore said.

Moore will have the honor this year of ringing the bell three times because she was the immediate supervisor to the three late professors.

She said she was close to all three of the women.

"I am deeply honored to do this. It is a special way to remember them," Moore said.

Moore said she hopes ringing the bell can be a tradition every year.

The college will also have a moment of silence and a solemn gathering in the courtyard, said Cheri Roy, the president of the Student Nurses at UA.

Roy said the bell was also rung two years ago when the College of Nursing reopened after being shut down for a week after the shooting.

On that day, students and faculty listened to the bell chime three times and together walked to the College of Nursing to begin classes.

"We think it is an excellent way to mark the event again," said Roy, a third-year nursing student.

Students in the College of Nursing will gather in the courtyard at 8:30 tomorrow morning for a closed ceremony, where a reverend from Monroe's church will say a few words.

Isabel Chavez, the special assistant to the dean of the College of Nursing, said Reverend Gordon McBride of Grace St. Paul's Episcopal Church has led all gatherings in the memory of the women.

Chavez said students will gather around "The Tree of Life," a ceramic tree donated to the college by the

nursing graduating class of 2003 after the shootings.

"The college has suspended business at 8:30 so the nursing community can attend," Chavez said.

Many nursing students will be at off-campus clinical sites and since all of the sites couldn't shut down for the moment of silence, they will observe the moment wherever they are, Roy said.

Students who remember the shootings have mixed feelings about the way the professors are being honored.

Josh Gershon, a management information systems senior, said the shooting was scary because it could have happened to anyone on campus.

Over the past two years, people seem to have forgotten the intensity of the event, Gershon said.

"I don't think the university has done a good job in remembering what happened," he said. "Students haven't forgotten, but I don't think they think about it all the time."

Leslie Janes, a political science junior, said the shooting happened when she was a freshman and she remembers teachers taking extra precautions.

Although the shooting occurred two years ago, Janes said she doesn't think UA students will forget even though the nation has probably long forgotten.

"Americans tend to have A.D.D. when it comes to stuff like that," Janes said.

Cassandra Chavez, a sociology junior, said she was saddened that professors died because of an angry student.

"People couldn't believe someone could put their anger out on teachers when it was his fault to begin with," Cassandra Chavez said.

Cassandra Chavez said ringing the bell will be a proper and respectful way to remember the professors that lost their lives.

Dean Starrett, a doctoral student studying computer science, said the bell isn't good enough to remember such a devastating event.

He said the general campus should gather together on this day and discuss safety issues on campus to make sure nothing like that ever happens again.

"We need to ask ourselves, 'what did we learn from this?'" Starrett said.

Starrett suggested the university should hold a forum every year on the anniversary so the problematic issues that led to the shootings can be addressed.

Last year, students held a candlelight vigil in the professors' memory and raised money for an endowment fund through a marathon in their name.