As I’m sure everyone will say, nothing about this year has been normal. For me, this is compounded with the fact that I technically already graduated last quarter, but still, after four years I’ll be damned if I don’t get to write one of these things.

Where do I start? Tentatively joining during Spring Quarter my freshman year, feeling late to the game and more than a little insecure about my lack of experience? About joining Arts & Entertainment, something I never thought I would do — after all, isn’t a newspaper about News? — and falling in love with a whole other world of journalism and media?

Or do I start after that, with the hours I spent in the office with the other editors, sending memes in the A&E group chat, and dragging myself out of my apartment every Sunday morning for a production meeting?

There’s no question that The UCSD Guardian defined my college experience — from my first article interviewing a UC San Diego grad student to my final senior send off, I have grown as a writer in ways I never would have imagined, and found a community through the school that I didn’t think was possible when I first set foot in recruitment. 

In my time with A&E, I’ve had the privilege of working with three different co-editors, two of which would go on to become Editor-in-Chief of the paper themselves. I don’t know if it’s impressive that I stayed with A&E so long, or if it shows a lack of ambition that I never tried to do anything else, but honestly, I loved where I was at. A&E, you’re the best. But you already knew that. 

I want to give special shout-outs to Sam and Alicia, who won’t read this but hired me my freshman year and subsequently changed the course of my college career. To Daisy, who went from being my assistant to my co-editor to my boss, which is honestly What She Deserves, and I’m sure is just a preface to an incredible career in journalism. And of course, to Jahfreen, who was the best co I could have asked for and will thrive as EIC, and Hemmy, who I could not have more confidence in for the future of A&E. 

Class of 2020, it’s been weird; it’s been good; it’s been scary and frustrating, but it’s also sure as hell been worth it <3

Art by Angela Liang for the UCSD Guardian.