I suppose I’ve grown accustomed to anonymity over the past
three years. After all, I live in a city of about 3 million people,
attend a school of roughly 37,000 students, and sit in a lecture
hall with as many as 300 students. Then, after class, from late
afternoon until the early morning, I disappear into the Daily Bruin
office to copy edit stories and write headlines.
Yet, I imagine many people have experienced this feeling, and I
think there are a hundred similar stories of incognito existence
among The Bruin’s student journalists. Added to them are 300
accounts that can be found in my lecture hall, 37,000 on campus,
and, well, you get the picture.
In a community as large as UCLA, there exists a labyrinth of
stories to be told. While working at the copy desk the past three
years, I have seen a few of these accounts; I have read about
alumni, faculty and students who had their experiences told in The
Bruin.
Size may limit the paper to a small group of people, but The
Bruin still manages to serve what I consider its main purpose: to
record the people and events that influence our lives. Whether this
means covering the undergraduate council or the end of
“Friends,” The Bruin allows people to break away (even
for a moment) from an anonymous lifestyle so inherent to UCLA. In
the process, it hopefully allows readers to gain a greater
knowledge and perhaps appreciation for the community around
them.
The Bruin tells stories of celebration, such as the most recent
NCAA title won by the softball team, but it also provokes and
challenges the way students perceive their university, as seen in
the many Viewpoint “Letters to the editor.”
I consider The Bruin a watchful eye over the campus ““
speaking out when things go wrong, yet also acknowledging them when
they are right.
The Bruin is a manifestation of our collective stories, and we
each have had a hand in creating a paper that I believe has somehow
made sense of UCLA’s disjointed nature. It has given a voice
to South Campus and to North Campus, to residents on the Hill and
to apartment dwellers. It has covered local issues in Westwood
development, state issues such as student fees and tuition, and
national issues, most notably the events in Iraq. All the while,
The Bruin manages to influence undergraduate and graduate students,
faculty members and community residents in some way.
But for all the stories that have been told this year and in the
past, I know there are many more waiting to be heard.
May next year’s staff take as much from the experience of
discovering the UCLA community as I have.
Chea was a 2003-2004 copy deputy.