It seems I have had a recurring conversation this past week, and that is what makes it worth writing about.
Tianna spends an entire week collecting the news that will be featured in the upcoming issue. We review them every Tuesday and finalize the list that will be distributed at the general body meeting. The news has been especially hard to collect these past few weeks. We are in, what I like to call, the “dull phase”.
The “dull phase” is a period of time in which nothing extremely notable is happening on this campus. Now, I do not mean the news we have covered is not important; I’m simply suggesting that the published work does not represent any events that are heavily altering our day-to-day lives at Stevens.
Take the Divestment From War Initiative, for example. This proclamation led to massive student body involvement and those protesting for what they believed in. It was an ongoing process for a few months and became a hot topic of conversation.
These events didn’t only cause an uproar among us, but also the alumni. Take the Gianforte Hall take back, as an example. They wrote in The Stute to fight for what they had accomplished during their time at Stevens. Moments like these are not one-time articles; they are a string of updates to gather all of what is happening around us.
This is what The Stute is meant for. We mirror the student body and the administration in the present day. The hope is that someone down the line reads the work and understands how impactful these events are to us, and how they affect future generations of Stevens students. We are literally a Stevens diary, capturing every moment that shapes our college experience.
Now, this is the exact reason news is one of the most important sections in our newspaper. These articles mirror our present. But there will not be something that alters our everyday Stevens experience every week. And I hope that there isn’t. Not every event is about us fighting for what we may believe in; they may be us showcasing the uneasy changes we are surrounded by. Articles covering the 45 lay-offs earlier this year, the budget cuts, and the Trump administration, are a representation of what Stevens and the world looks like through our eyes.
The memories may be in our heads, but it is the words on paper that make history. The Stute covers it all, the good, the bad, and the ugly, to show an accurate view of what is happening with us in the present day. But, yeah, not every week is groundbreaking, and thank god for that! It is only when we are in our “dull phase” that we, as Stuters, can appreciate the mirror we have created.
