The relationship between the faculty, staff and students of Texas Wesleyan University and the Rambler Media Group continues to grow and strengthen.

This is my second semester at both Texas Wesleyan and the Rambler, and I have noticed the way the Wesleyan community looks at the Rambler group has changed for the better. More people are excited and interested in reading the articles written online or in the bi-weekly newspaper.

People are commenting on and sharing more Rambler stories on social media sites.The relationship between the Rambler and members of the Wesleyan community continues to grow and be beneficial to both parties.

As the new editor-in-chief, I have many goals to make this semester one of the best for the Rambler to increase the positive outlook the campus has toward us, and increase the amount of readers, viewers, and followers on social media.

Accuracy is an essential key to each and every story written or recorded. With the sea of information the public gets on a daily basis through news media sites, social media, and radio stations, accuracy can be hard to come by. The Rambler hopes to take the next step to assist students, staff, and faculty with accurate news on a daily and bi-weekly basis.

Implementing more social media and multiple multimedia aspects in stories is a great way we hope to gain more interested followers. By using social media sites such as Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram more frequently, we are able to grasp a larger audience and gain more interested followers. We hope to implement the social media site Snapchat this semester to give viewers the chance to get an inside look at what it takes to be a Rambler staff member and the hard work we put in on a daily basis.

More multimedia will help us cultivate readers that are interested in learning about an event or topic through a video, infographic, or audio slideshow, rather than reading a text-based article. We understand some readers are interested in learning about the events we cover but after a hard day of class work or studying a person can become tired of reading throughout the day. By using multimedia, we are able to give our audience much more than a text story.

By creating a podcast show, we are able to give students the chance to gain more insight on the opinions and the views of the staff members who are hard at work at the Rambler. We have so many great, hardworking staff members who spend countless hours informing the campus of important events both on and off campus, but readers don’t really get the chance to see what goes into creating a story or editing a video. By creating our “Under the Shade Tree” podcast, readers can get an in-depth look at the hard work Rambler staff members put in. A new edition of “Under the Shade Tree” is available at therambler.org every Thursday.

Like all good news publications, we want to cover news that readers need to know; as a college news organization, we want to let students know about things that are happening on campus and in student life. We hope to impact the lives of students on campus, so if they feel a need for a topic or issue to be brought to the attention of President Frederick Slabach and Wesleyan’s administration, we can give them that voice. We can impact not only Wesleyan students, but also members of the surrounding Polytechnic community, those following our social media, or even your average person who one day just decided to pick up a Rambler newspaper.

This semester, I hope to have our staff uncover many more stories that trigger people to speak up if they have a concern. Last semester, our editor, Dalise DeVos, continued that trend when she wrote a column called “The Monster That No One Else Hears.” She wrote about the difficulties of having a mental issue and trying to get through a day while having that little voice in your ear that tells you, “You can’t do it” or “Just stop trying.” She gave a voice to the 40,000,000 adults that suffer with some type of anxiety disorder each day. Some of those, I assume, are our campus.

I hope by covering topics that are much more personal, we are able to speak up for the little guy and let them know their voices are heard. We are the voice for the thousands of students at Wesleyan looking for change, greatness, and for someone to speak up for them.

All in all, I hope to make this a semester we get people on the Wesleyan campus to continue speaking up for what they believe.

This may not be the best semester the Rambler Media Group has, but it’s definitely going to go down in the books as one of them. I hope to make that impact.