I am currently writing this on Wednesday, April 22, for the issue coming out this Friday. For those of you who don’t know, that is really bad. The due date for opinion articles is on Sunday evening. That is one way to put into perspective the absolute chaos that has been ensuing as we approach the semester’s end.
Seeing as this will be the last you hear from me in the Mind of a Freshman column, I would like to reflect on the past year that I have had.
I started my journey here at Stevens on Stute Weekend 2025. I was presented with the opportunity to write an opinion article and apply to be one of the columnists for the column you’re reading now. I was looking for a community, and so I went to The Stute meetings, knowing that I would see at least a few friendly faces. It was at that first meeting that I learned of an opening for another opinion writer, and I proposed The Language of Flowers as a potential column.
I wanted so badly to become closer to the members of the e-board whom I had met just a few weeks prior. So, I took on a ton of articles and took any opportunity I saw open up. This quickly escalated as I wrote more and began writing for all the different pages.
The first article that I took at an actual meeting was about the new DEI laws and how Stevens was adapting to these protocols. I anticipated it to be simple as I was just going to contact a few different people in administration and continue from there. It was then that I learned that it wasn’t going to be nearly as easy as I had anticipated. I kept on being redirected, and as I tried learning more, I hit more roadblocks. I worked closely with Tianna—our managing editor—as she directed me through the process. In the end, that article had been postponed through three issues, and I only ever got one quote to use, meaning I couldn’t write anything on the topic. It was at that point that I swore off writing news articles.
Time went on, and as the semester passed, I navigated my start to college the best I could, making many mistakes along the way. It was around the time I came back to school to rush a sorority with my friends that Jiya—our editor-in-chief—reached out to me asking me to be The Stute’s news editor. I was torn because I wanted to be more involved, but I sucked at mitigating bias. I said yes despite my worries, and I did not do the best job. I did my best to learn and improve, but it was still nowhere close to where I would have liked my skill to be. Unfortunately, I never completely got a hold of being the news editor, but I’m getting to see Josh Bodenstein—news editor—rise to the occasion.
I wound up running for e-board as the Layout Editor, and good news: I got it! I’ve done the layout for the past couple of issues. I’ve certainly made a lot of mistakes along the way, and I’m learning more and more as I go along. It’s been nerve-wracking, but it’s been very worth it. So to The Stute, thank you for a great first year. I can’t wait for many more.
