Raymond Lopez, a first-year student at Utah Valley University, was still wearing black scrubs from an overnight shift as a nursing assistant on Wednesday when he settled onto a purple couch by a makeshift memorial to Charlie Kirk.
It was the first day that classes had resumed since Mr. Kirk, a conservative activist, was slain last Wednesday, maybe a five-minute walk away from the memorial. Mr. Lopez, 26, brought a sign he made, black marker on bright green poster board, advertising “Free Hugs.”
“I just didn’t want people to feel scared to be on campus because I know that I’m scared to be on campus,” Mr. Lopez said. “I don’t really know how else I can help.”
There were big bear hugs and outpourings of gratitude, but business at the free hugs couch was slow, if steady, as Utah Valley turned from a crime scene back to a working campus. Most students rushed past with little more than a glance, a nod to a truth about Utah Valley, and about the nation at large.
For many of the 3,000 or so people who packed into the campus courtyard to see Mr. Kirk, and for those at the university who center politics and faith in their daily routines, the tragedy may be a defining event in their lives. But with 46,000 students, Utah Valley is a small city of a school, and a lot of them on Wednesday just seemed in a hurry to get back to class.
“I’ve never heard anyone be like actively political and starting things that don’t need to be started,” said James Jordan, 21, a student from Syracuse, Utah, who is in his second year studying business management. “I think everyone here gets along really well, because we’re just all really busy.”
Though often overshadowed by nearby Brigham Young University, or by its more urban neighbor the University of Utah in Salt Lake City, Utah Valley is a unique academic experiment: a small welding college that grew into a community college, a commuter school and now the largest university in the state. It is also the largest “dual-mission college” in the country, offering both bachelors degrees and career-focused training and associates degrees.
More than 80 percent of the student body works more than 31 hours a week at a paying job, and more than 40 percent are first-generation college students.
“It’s not perfect by any means, but a lot of students choose U.V.U. because of diversity, because they can come here and have their beliefs and their background and be whoever they are,” said Lori Duke, a graduate of the school who is the program manager for the graduate marriage and family therapy department.
She was meeting with a prospective student in her office during Mr. Kirk’s rally last week when panicked students rushed in seeking safety. Ms. Duke and about 15 students, including several high school visitors desperate to call their parents, sheltered in her office for 45 minutes.
“Our governor told us last week that this can be a watershed: We can either come together and choose the good, or we can let it tear us apart,” Ms. Duke said, referring to Gov. Spencer Cox, who made an impassioned plea after the assassination to move past political violence.
“I hate to call this a learning moment, but these students really are learning how to be adults,” she continued. “For a lot of them, this is the first time in their life they’ve gotten to make adult choices. This is a big one to start with.”
Adam Blanchard, 26, a junior studying aviation with dreams of becoming a commercial pilot, said he had been contemplating how he would continue to respond to Mr. Kirk’s death. A competitive ballroom dancer, he plans to seek permission from the university to craft a performance for an upcoming show to honor Mr. Kirk and remember the shooting, a waltz, perhaps, set to “Amazing Grace.”
“I think there are a lot of people at U.V.U. who are a little quieter about their faith and their more conservative beliefs,” he said. “I do believe that the scriptures have a lot of prophecies about what would happen in the later days of the earth, and this lines up. That’s not something I’d maybe have been as comfortable saying out loud to you a week ago.”
Utah Valley has a large population of students who, like Mr. Blanchard, identify as members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Still, the student population is more culturally diverse than nearby Brigham Young, which was founded by the church, and seemed a less obvious place for Mr. Kirk to kick off his American Comeback tour.
“When I heard that Charlie Kirk was coming to campus, it was the first time in a very long time that I was like, ‘Oh, this could be pretty controversial, this could rile people up,’” said Joe Vogel, who teaches an interdisciplinary course on the 1980s at the university. “It just wasn’t a very U.V.U. thing to have a political speaker like that.”
Mr. Vogel knows campus politics well. His brother directs the school’s Center for National Security Studies, and his parents both taught English at the university. Two decades ago when he was a student, he and another student government leader arranged to bring the liberal documentary filmmaker Michael Moore to what was then known as Utah Valley State College.
The invitation drew protests, a lawsuit and death threats against Mr. Vogel and another student. Mr. Vogel and other student government leaders eventually agreed to also invite a conservative commentator, Sean Hannity, for a separate event to help quell the tumult. Police urged Mr. Vogel and his classmate to think about wearing bulletproof vests onstage, he said, during Mr. Moore and Mr. Hannity’s separate appearances. They ultimately decided against it because the speeches were indoors and audience members had to enter through metal detectors.
Mr. Kirk’s outdoor rally was much harder to secure, a fact that some students and faculty have noted to local media since his death. They have also complained that campus police sent a confusing assortment of messages in the moments after the shooting. During a tour of campus with reporters on Wednesday, the university’s president, Astrid Tuminez, said her administration was conducting a security review to learn any pertinent lessons and assure students that they are safe and their school remains a welcoming environment.
A vigil is planned for Friday afternoon, and memorials have risen organically around campus, including chalk messages on walls and sidewalks and a growing collections of flags, photos, stuffed animals, handwritten notes, and Chicago Cubs paraphernalia, a nod to Mr. Kirk’s chosen team.
“One of the things that impressed me about America is the way Americans are able to disagree respectfully,” said Ms. Tuminez, who immigrated from the Philippines as a teenager. “We have a chance to do that now.”
How the campus moves forward, she said, is “a choice.”