By By Anne Baker, News Staff

Members of the Northeastern community gathered in Egan Hall yesterday to commemorate the life of slain student Rebecca Payne by presenting a regional scholarship in her honor. The ceremony, which was attended by Payne’s parents, was a tearful tribute to the athletic training major.
‘It’s a sad day,’ said her father, Nicholas. ‘But it’s a happy day that so many people are here to remember Rebecca.’
Payne, 22, was shot to death last May in her Mission Hill apartment. There have been no arrests in connection to the crime.
The scholarship is being offered through the National Athletic Training Association Research and Education Foundation, said Jeff Stone, the regional director for the organization. The funds for the scholarship come from donations ‘- including one from Payne’s parents ‘- and money raised through the sale of green rubber bracelets honoring Payne.
The $2,000 scholarship will benefit an athletic training student at a New England college. Stone said the scholarship will be fully endowed in four years and the organization is halfway toward raising the necessary $52,000. The first scholarship will be awarded later this year.
Chris Letzeiser, an assistant in the Bouve College of Health Sciences, opened the ceremony, briefly speaking about Payne. Her parents then thanked those in attendance and two students presented a $7,500 check for the Rebecca Payne Memorial Fund.
Of the 15 or so people in attendance, many teared up throughout the ceremony and most donned the green bracelets they helped sell to earn funds for Payne’s scholarship.
Afterward, Virginia Payne, Rebecca’s mother, said athletic training was important to Rebecca and the scholarship helps her memory live on.
‘That was something very dear to her heart,’ she said.
Stone, who graduated from Northeastern’s Athletic Training Program in 1976, said the university’s recent decision to cut the major was a contributing factor in creating the scholarship with the National Athletic Training Association.
‘It’s one of the reasons we’re doing it this way,’ he said.
Though the scholarship is not affiliated with Northeastern, several members of the administration were in attendance at the meeting, including Bouve Dean Stephen Zoloth and Senior Vice President for Enrollment and Student Life Philomena Mantella.
Senior athletic training major Kelly Gadberry said Payne was ‘very much’ a part of the close-knit athletic training community, and was passionate about her major.
‘If we can learn anything from that, we can award a scholarship to someone who embodies what Rebecca was about and honor her memory,’ she said.