Mary Karen Read

In popularity-driven contests for high school homecoming queen, it's rare for a marching band member to be in the running.

Yet at Annandale High School in fall 2005, Mary Karen Read, a clarinet player, was a finalist.

"Our band has the same reputation as pretty much every band at every high school," said Annandale senior Emily Sample, a friend of Read from the band. "She was a 'bandy.' But she was a finalist because she was the kind of person who fit in everywhere, because her personality was so bright and shiny."

Read, 19, was nearing the end of her freshman year at Virginia Tech, her uncle Ted Kuppinger said.

As a lacrosse player, a member of the National Honor Society, the indoor color guard, the French club and the marching band at Annandale High School, she left behind a wide circle of friends and family in Northern Virginia and elsewhere struggling with her death.

"As my band teacher said today, she had a smile that could brighten up the entire room," said senior Greg Rosenstein, a friend and fellow clarinet player. "She pretty much touched the lives of everyone she met."

Read had not yet declared a college major, but friends said she was considering a career teaching children.

Like Cho Seung-Hui, the student identified by police as the shooter, Read was born in South Korea, Kuppinger said. Her mother is from Korea and her father is from New York, he said.

Read initially had trouble adjusting to Virginia Tech's large campus, but had recently begun making friends and was considering joining a sorority, her aunt, Karen Kuppinger, told The Associated Press.

-- Sean Mussenden, Media General News Service