UT student begins fundraiser for family of Covenant School shooting victim

students who were all aged nine, and three additional adults who were staff members at the school. Evelyn Dieckhaus, 9; Mike Hill, 61; William Kinney, 9; Katherine Koonce, 60; Cynthia Peak, 61; and Hallie Scruggs, 9 were all victims who lost their lives in the attack. This marked the 128th mass shooting of 2023.

The tragic shooting hit close to home for many individuals across Tennessee. One student in particular, senior political science major Cole Hubbard, was determined to help in any way he could.

“I was at school at my frat house when dad sent me a text to link the story, I was shocked. I started asking my frat brothers, who are mostly from Nashville, if they knew any victims of the shooting. One of my friends actually went to The Covenant School and I started realizing how many connections there were here,” Hubbard said.

Hubbard is a current member of the fraternity Phi Gamma Delta and served as president of the chapter last year. As a Nashville raised civilian, Hubbard soon suspected he, or others close to him, would know someone who had a personal connection to the victims of the shooting.

“Upon asking around I realized Chad Scruggs, who was a 2001 graduate of UTK and brother of our fraternity, lost his daughter, Hallie, in the attack. He also started ‘the Cross’ here on campus when he was a student. This brotherhood is forever and we wanted to show our support. We owe it to him to give him alum support in any way we can,” Hubbard said.

Hubbard started a donation page similar to “GoFundMe” called Spotfund. In just one day, Hubbard surpassed his five-thousand dollar goal by almost one-thousand dollars and has received donations from over 194 donors.

The page continues to receive donations daily with many leaving comments and messages about their donations and how they can continue to help in such a difficult time.

Trey Tarkington, a sophomore business major and member of Phi Gamma Delta, was also incredibly heartbroken by the news.

donate, was just so powerful,” Hubbard said.

Once other fraternities saw how quickly Hubbard was able to raise funds, they too wanted to take part in a project that could support a fellow UT alumni and fraternity brother at this unimaginable time.

Phi Gamma Delta and AOII are two fraternities that are currently collaborating on a fundraiser to raise money for the victims and their families.

On Monday, March 27, Audrey Hale shot and killed six individuals at a private Catholic school in Nashville. The attack killed three

Just hours after the news of the attack broke, the brothers of Phi Gamma Delta found that a former fraternity brother was the father of one of the victims.

“This hits really close to home for me because of the many connections I have to not only the school but the church. I have nothing but amazing memories of attending church services and Sunday school there with my friends and it was absolutely heartbreaking to hear the news of what happened,” Tarkington said.

“I had no idea what to set the goal as, I just figured 5,000 was a decent and reasonable goal. Seeing people I haven’t spoken to in years