WE SOLICIT YOUR ATTENTION. A quilting bee is in progress.

Northern Illinois University Libraries is asking local quilters for help in creating a memorial quilt dedicated to the victims of the Feb. 14 campus shooting that left six people, including the gunman, dead and 16 others injured.

The king-size quilt will have 288 red, black and white squares, NIU associate professor Rebecca Martin said. The 11-by-11-inch fabric squares will be distributed to people in the community, who are invited to decorate them before returning them to the library. A group of library staffers will then assemble the decorated squares into a finished quilt, Martin said.

There is a due date.

Any member of the community can pick up a free quilt square from the information desk inside Founders Memorial Library on Normal Road in DeKalb. The squares will be given out on a first-come, first-served basis.

Squares can be picked up from Monday through April 8, and finished squares must be returned in person or by mail no later than April 30.

The finished quilt will become a display in the library.