Red solo cups litter Gayley Avenue. Pop music blares out of townhouses. 2 a.m. approaches.

And while most UCLA students celebrate their Thursday night out, our Kerckhoff Hall office buzzes with activity.

Copy editors proofread the next day’s print paper. Designers maximize every inch of space. Editors answer questions, write captions, check facts and prepare the next day’s stories. Many of them do so after working a second job, attending classes, cramming for midterms and dropping everything to cover breaking news.

Being at the Daily Bruin invariably means sacrifice.

I have learned this firsthand. I’ve woken up to 3 a.m. phone calls, sent messages from vacation, left midterms early and brought my MacBook to date nights. I’ve ditched more friends, taken more rain checks and canceled more hangouts than I care to count. Experiences like mine are common: Daily Bruin staffers can average more than 5,000 Slack messages a month.

Our sacrifice seems to stand in stark contrast to the world outside.

At a time where protesters and vice chancellors cower behind the blanket of anonymity, we sign our names to our work and share our email addresses online. We sacrifice our privacy to model accountability, admitting our mistakes and publishing criticisms of our own reporting.

Our reporters fight to ensure we get every side of the story, sacrificing opportunities to share their opinions, be leaders in the public square or run for office.

The press has faced unprecedented challenges in recent years. Student newsrooms from Indiana to Oklahoma have shuttered print products. National broadsheets have laid off veteran reporters. Billionaires have pulled editorials.

But we are still fighting to serve.

Our investigative journalists exposed UCLA for wasting hundreds of millions of dollars. Our editorial board has led campus conversations, condemning a chancellor and calling for better discourse. Our photographers, programmers and artists have collaborated to share the truth in innovative ways.

We were the only paper to brave the cold and cover the Palestine solidarity encampment day and night. During the January 2025 Los Angeles County fires, our reporters were the first to tell thousands of students the evacuation warning they received was in error. We covered the largest strike in higher education history, running more than a dozen news stories.

We’ve interviewed far and wide, stayed late and woken early. We have worked thousands of hours to tell these stories and serve our community.

To all the staffers who have fought and sacrificed – thank you.

Thank you for promoting our values even through the moments of frustration and doubt. Thank you for choosing to give up other parts of your college experience to keep your fellow students informed. Our staff’s sacrifice of time, energy and other opportunities is at the heart of telling these incredible stories.

Thank you in particular to Shiv Patel and Zimo Li – my two managing editors – for putting aside everything else in their lives this year to steward this special organization. I’m grateful they chose to do so, especially since they both have the industry, insight and intelligence to succeed anywhere.

[Related: Student journalism, in all its shortcomings, taught me to be brave -30-]

But most of all, I want to thank our community for trusting us.

One of the most important things I’ve learned at The Bruin – from one of my most important mentors – is that every story matters to someone. For us, a story can be a chance to prove yourself, get on the front page or learn a new skill. But for our sources, stories represent their hopes and dreams, fears and anxieties.

Everyone who has sat for a portrait, agreed to an interview or shared facts with an investigation has made a kind of sacrifice too. By sharing their story, they sacrificed control over how it’s told. Thank you to everyone who has made that sacrifice: You also are critical to keeping what we do alive.

I am sure that over the next few years, the media – and the values of truth, accountability and nuanced storytelling that we promote – will face more attacks. If students and faculty want to keep these values alive, they must keep volunteering their stories. Doing so will take sacrifice, but it is one they must make.

Because if there’s one thing I’ve learned these last four years, it is that there is no service without sacrifice.

Winward was the 2025-26 editor in chief and sat ex officio on the editorial board. He was previously the 2024-25 News editor and the 2023-24 features and student life editor. Winward was also Copy staff and an Arts, Online, Outreach, Photo, PRIME and Sports contributor.