When I first thought about writing this column, I wanted it to be special.
I wanted it to be witty, smart and profound, and basically every overachieving, cliched term in the book. Ask my friends, I tried for days to make it sound like that. But I can't do it.
For four years, I've been a Daily Collegian staff member, taught to write short, concise stories and worry less about what matters to me and more about what matters to you, our readers. I've tried to teach younger staffers the same.
I've been taught to tell the truth, so to try to write something that isn't "me" wouldn't do my final column any justice.
So here's the truth: I'm going to miss this place.
I'll miss Penn State, I'll miss State College, I'll miss the bars and the classes and the living away from home. But the
Collegian and my friends -- my family -- who work here, hands down, is what I'm having the most trouble leaving. It's become an irreplaceable part of my life.
It's something non-staff members probably can't understand, but it's exactly the thing that should keep readers coming back for more.
We're a family here. We walk into this office, in the basement of the James Building, and we try to figure out what's going on in your lives, on campus, in town, everywhere. We try to jump inside your heads and ask ourselves what you really, truly want and need to know.
Without that bond, I don't think we'd be able to be here all day, every day; without that teamwork and mutual respect, nothing would get done. It gives us the ability to tell you how much your tuition's going up, what the university's doing to make the campus climate more comfortable for you, how many programs are possible thanks to funding from UPAC.
And I think we do a damn good job of it.
There are roughly 200 members of the News Division, and make no mistake about it, we are journalists -- not student journalists, but real journalists who just so happen to also be students.
We are independent of the university so we can better hold your administrators, your elected student leaders and your elected town officials accountable for doing what is in your best interest.
I've seen unbelievable young talent here that inspires me and keeps me believing there's a future in journalism. I know reporters aren't always the most popular people, but the young men and women who work in this office have earned my utmost respect.
They're the whole package, from the reporters who are most visible, down to the page designers, photographers, graphic artists and copy editors who go mostly unrecognized by the public eye.
It is those individuals who worry about whether stories are relevant to you, understandable to you, and accessible to you.
We're not perfect, but nobody is -- not even The New York Times.
I hope what we've given you during your time at Penn State is what you've wanted, and I hope future Collegian staffers can do the same. That's our job, and believe me, we all try to do the best job we can.
It's our job to keep you up-to-date on life so you can go about living it. Think about that -- 200 of us are responsible for knowing what's important to 38,800 other people. That takes a lot of working together. That's why this family is important, and that's part of why I'll miss it so much.
For the record, I'm not graduating this semester. For reasons that don't matter here, I'm moving back home to Philadelphia, I'm hopefully getting a job and I'm going to finish my degree there.
Sometimes life doesn't always work the way you want, but my time at the Collegian certainly has been the exception to that rule.
My future is somewhat in front of me, and in that respect, I'm running toward the door. But there's so much here to appreciate that I'm hanging on to the final few moments by a thread.
By the time this column is published, my time here, and my tenure as the Collegian's managing editor, will be over. But everyone else will still be here, doing what countless staff members have done for the last 118 years.
And I hope -- for their sake and yours -- that you're right there along with them.
