A year ago today, we were all Hokies.

A student-turned-gunman stormed the campus of Virginia Tech and killed 30 fellow students and two professors last April, marking the deadliest shooting in American history.

Since that day, UF has stepped up its mental-health services, emergency notifications and police training to prevent a similar tragedy.

Virginia Tech’s darkest hour may serve as the most important lesson on emergency preparedness U. Florida will ever receive.

Warning Signs

After media reports revealed that Seung-Hui Cho, the Virginia Tech shooter, had a troubled past, UF and other universities took a hard look at their mental-health programs, asking a tough question: Could the Virginia Tech tragedy have been prevented if action had been taken to treat the student before he became a killer?

During his first year at Virginia Tech, Cho, a 23-year-old English major, wrote essays about suicide, murder and revenge for his classes.

His depictions made fellow students uncomfortable, and he was approached by a few of his teachers after class.

But that didn’t stop him from acting on his sinister thoughts on April 16, 2007.