A student who “had no problem being who he was” will be remembered with a scholarship in his name.

Ryan Rendleman, 22, of Batavia, was killed April 29 after his Honda was rear ended by a tractor-trailer in a construction area on highway 127 near Carbondale.

A senior at Southern Illinois University, he was less than two weeks away from graduating with a degree in photojournalism. He was on his way to an assignment for the Daily Egyptian, the school’s student newspaper, when the accident occurred.

Now, four professors at SIU are creating a scholarship in Rendleman’s name, which will go to a photojournalism student at the school beginning in the spring 2009 semester.

Journalism professor William Recktenwald said the professors hope to collect the $25,000 necessary to create the endowed scholarship.

Already, students and community members have given money toward the scholarship, he said, including an SIU graduate who had known Ryan several years before who stopped to make a contribution.

“Ryan touched the lives of many people here,” Recktenwald said.

Earlier this month, despite being in the midst of finals week, more than 200 students gathered in front of the journalism building at SIU to plant a redbud tree as a tribute.
SIU student Jason Johnson is grieving his friend.

“We were really close,” he said. “It was a shock. It kind of puts you in touch with your own mortality.”

At the May 10 commencement ceremony, where Rendleman was awarded his degree posthumously, nearly all the students donned white ribbons in remembrance of him.

Johnson said he and Rendleman, both photojournalists, tended to look at their work for the Daily Egyptian the same way.

“Some days we’d be on a high because we got some great pictures, and some days we’d think everybody in the world is better than us,” he said.

He lauds Rendleman as a “super great guy.”

“He was good at standing up for people and he had no problems being who he was or saying what he thought,” he said.

The driver of the tractor-trailer that rear ended Rendleman, Kevin E. Morrison, 51, of Beacher City, did not notice Rendleman had stopped, said state trooper Scott Tolliver, a certified crash reconstructionist with the state police.

Rendleman’s car was pushed forward into another semitrailer.

Morrison was ticketed for failure to reduce speed to avoid an accident, Tolliver said.