DEKALB, Ill. (AP) - Her first week of classes at Northern Illinois University made it clear to freshman Miraynda Castro that she wasn't beginning her college career at just any campus.

Her philosophy teacher asked for a show of hands: Did students want the classroom door left open - or did they want it locked.

"I think it's a good question to ask from now on ... obviously I'd feel safer if it was closed because nobody could get in," said Castro.

However, the vote was for open, so classmates arriving late could get in, she said.

Almost seven months after former student Steven Kazmierczak burst through an unlocked classroom door on Valentine's Day and fatally wounded five students, then killed himself, campus life is beginning to return to normal.

But reminders, fears and anxieties linger.

"Some students ... were apprehensive about coming back," said Scott Peska, director of the university's Office of Support and Advocacy, started in April to help students, faculty and staff deal with the tragedy.

Some came to campus early to see their classrooms and make sure they would feel comfortable. Some told about having difficulty with Fourth of July fireworks, some who said they were fine during the summer suddenly began having trouble sleeping or experiencing nightmares.

Few physical signs remain of the deadly attack at Cole Hall.

From the outside, it looks like any other building except for small bunches of dried purple flowers hanging on door handles. Students walk past locked doors and windows covered with signs that say "Forward, Together, Forward," the motto the university adopted after the shootings.

Yet, there is "a low-grade fear" around the campus, NIU employee relations director Deborah Haliczer says.

Kristen Myers, the Sociology Department's graduate director, has changed her teaching style. She now allows cell phones and wishes there was a flashing light in every classroom so professors could be alerted to threats.

"I told the students, no erratic behavior allowed," said Myers, who at different times had taught Kazmierczak and one of the students he killed, 19-year-old sophomore Ryanne Mace.

"But you know, Steven Kazmierczak never made anybody feel weird," she says. "On an open campus there's only so much you can do. You either do this job or you don't."

Castro, who was still in high school the day of the attack, says she chose the university before the shootings and stuck with her decision.

"I feel they have more safety precautions," said Castro, 18, of Machesney Park. "My mom freaks out about it. She just worries that it happened before, like any mom she's nervous."

Castro's mother, Vikki Nalevac, said having her youngest daughter go away to college was hard enough without the worry of violence, and she tried to get Castro to change her mind about going to NIU.

"I'm worried about her just walking to the bus stop, to the buildings," Nalevac says. "It's one more worry that I really don't want and I don't need. I just have a knot in my stomach all the time."

But on campus, students and faculty agree that such senseless violence can happen anywhere, in a shopping mall in Omaha, Neb., a Lane Bryant store in a Chicago suburb, and even in a rural Amish schoolhouse in Pennsylvania.

They're all facing the issue in their own ways.

"After it happened I knew security and police, they'd be ensuring our safety, watching us," said freshman Christina Miller, 18, of Bolingbrook, who wants to major in biology. "I've been wanting to come here for a while. It's a positive experience for me. I feel welcome here."

Psychology senior Nancy Canas, 22, of Chicago, laughs with sorority girlfriends in the Holmes Student Center - but they grow quiet when the subject turns to the shootings.

Their friend, 20-year-old Catalina Garcia, was one of the victims.

"I knew where she lived," Canas said. "In the student center, I knew where she sat. I try not to think about it, try to move forward with the year. That's what all of us are trying to do."

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