This certainly has been a fun summer, hasn’t it?
If you’re just setting foot on this University, here’s a quick update: We elected an SGA vice president who shook the University with a comment about Black Lives Matter. Then, when students of all colors lobbied for a punishment, we raised hell on national television over freedom of speech. We trended on Twitter. We were on Fox News.
Then we got guns, too. Do you feel safe yet? All around you — in classes, in the parking garage, in the line for Chick-fil-A — guns have infiltrated our once-safe university. Now, the paranoia can set in.
Or maybe it won’t. Our reporting over the last few months has shown a greater willingness to work with the policy, which was crafted in extreme detail by a group of University representatives, than liberals might have anticipated.
That doesn’t mean I like it, but here’s what it does say about the University: We’re practical. We compromise. We work within the limits of what we have. And we hope — and pray, if that’s your thing — that no one gets shot.
As I enter my senior year, I’m aware that this might be the most tumultuous semesters of my college career. Our football team, which went nearly undefeated last year, has a real shot at the Big 12. The University system is set to expand into Katy. A few weeks ago, I sat in on a CoogTV interview where President and Chancellor Renu Khator claimed plans to focus the next few years of her term on issues of the Third Ward.
And internally, we’re getting our fountain back, after — how long has it been? — nearly two years.
After multiple promises and pushed-back deadlines, the dried-up concrete bowl had become something of an existential metaphor for the University’s treatment of its students, who complained about money catered to Athletics instead of fountain repairs, and who quietly fixated on the fairness of filling it up for just one night to present Donald Trump with a pretty campus back in February.
This year, I aim to lead The Cougar to tell the stories of students like those, who feel a gap between themselves and the administration. Because, ultimately, we exist to inform you; to tell both the good and the bad stories of your neighbors and your community, which does not stop at Scott Street; and above all, to hold the University accountable for actions that always affect you, directly or indirectly.
Behind me is the most talented and hardworking staff with whom I have ever had the privilege of working. You may not see them, but they are the news-junkie heroes in the shadows.
Guns, casual racism and national infamy aside, I’m looking forward to bringing you the news every week (and online daily).
I hope you’ll stay informed.