When I was sneaking to my family desktop at 9 years old to write short stories at 4 a.m. I never thought I’d be the editor-in-chief of a newspaper.
I thought my farewell column would be easy because as a junior, I’m not actually leaving, but it’s bringing up all kinds of memories and thoughts about the future.
I met some of my best friends working at The BG News. I also met some really cool BG News editors from before my time through internships, and they have become staples in my life as best friends and mentors.
The BG News is a family, and watching people come and go over the last few years has been sad but exciting. I’m so proud of this year’s seniors and all they have accomplished, and I know they will do even more great things as they enter the professional world. There’s no describing the kind of connections you make when you’re approaching deadline at 1 a.m. and want to break a story for the next days paper.
For three years, I’ve been developing these connections and falling in love with journalism and hard news. When I took the position of editor-in-chief about a year ago, I was full of excitement for all the things I wanted to do this year, and full of fear I’d mess it all up. However, I had an amazing staff that made the operation run pretty smoothly.
Over the past year I saw the last newspaper come out of our old office in West Hall, and if I remember right I cried. There’s something sentimental about losing the place your career really got its start. But that’s just a building — not my team and supporters.
I also got to oversee the first newspaper and Key Magazine created in the new Kuhlin Center from start to finish. We are evolving as a media field and as University student media.
We struggled this year to get accustomed to our new surroundings. It’s not easy to be full-time students with the ambitions of being full-time reporters. Our staff is small and works countless hours to bring the best news to our readers, and I hope we’ve been able to do that for the most part this year.
Next year, we’ll do even better.
While I won’t be the editor of The BG News anymore, I will be working as a student director of Falcon Media, our umbrella organization encompassing The BG News, BG24 News, WBGU, Falcon Radio and several other publications. Through the Falcon Media efforts, I’ll be working with leaders of all the individual organization to bring the best content over several platforms to reach the largest audiences in the way they want to get their news most.
I’m looking forward to the changes coming in the near future.
In the meantime, The BG News is being left in great hands. Hannah Finnerty, the current city editor, and Keefe Watson, the current campus editor, will do amazing things in the top two positions, and I look forward to working with them in a new capacity. They have an inspiring amount of drive and love for news.
Student media at the University is full of insanely talented people right now, and together we have so many opportunities to do great things in news.
Please reach out to me at my personal email [email protected] with any comments or suggestions for better ways to get your news. I’m always interested in what our audiences have to say.
Reply to Holly at
