Coming into Boston University and knowing I wanted to go into journalism, I told myself I wasn’t going to jump feet first into the school paper. I just wanted to get my toes wet and take things slow, I thought, so I wouldn’t overload myself first semester freshman year.

Oops.

Four semesters, tons of bylines and too many lost hours of sleep later, here I am, ready to retire from my in-office Daily Free Press duties. A former editor-in-chief called me “a fool and a masochist” when I became managing editor, and at this point I can’t really disagree.

But all jokes aside, enough about me. This semester – as with all semesters, I suppose – life at the FreeP wasn’t about one individual.

It wasn’t about one issue or one story, either.

This semester was, for better or for worse, about all of us. It was about blowing up each other’s phones when there was breaking news – and we all know there was plenty of excitement in the department the last five months. It was about picking up each other’s slack when needed. It was about critiquing each other as peers, caring about each other as friends and competing with each other as fellow journalists.

Oh, and it was about Bertucci’s rolls.

As the youngest Free Press editorial board in recent memory – if not ever – we invested thousands of hours into reporting on one of the most hectic semesters we could imagine. And we did a good job. Haters gon’ hate, but we learned to deal with it. Most of us do want to go into journalism after all – Journalists are never hated, right?

Starting from literally Day 1 – Dec. 12 – we covered events that changed forever the lives of those involved. As the semester continued, phrases like “sexual assault,” “rape culture” and “task force“ filled our pages. “Hazing” and “murder” eventually joined them.

Some heavy stuff, to say the least. It left us all a bit gobsmacked.

But we – operative word – learned a lot about journalism, ourselves and each other while covering it all. Even when the mood in our absolutely spotless office got as heavy as the news, someone was there to lift it. Be it by making a joke or being the center of one, someone always came through for the sake of the group.

I know I speak for everyone when I say that for that I am incredibly appreciative.

But on that same note, it is easy to look past all the positive news. In what seems like years ago, the BU community pulled together after an Allston house fire left several Sigma Alpha Mu members homeless and one in critical condition. Then there was the women’s hockey team making a postseason run – again – as well as plans for New Balance Athletic Field in West Campus, renovations to Myles Standish Hall and rumblings of a StuVi 3.

And through it all, our talented reporters were there to cover it all for you, the readers, and to a certain extent ourselves, just to make sure there was indeed good news out there somewhere.

Thanks for getting FreePy with us. So long.

-Tim Healey

The Daily Free Press

Managing Editor Spring 2012