To The Round Up,
Since becoming a student at NMSU, I have pulled a million all-nighters, switched majors three times, and joined one internship.
I became a staff writer at The Round Up during my junior year in 2024. It was something new to get myself out of my shell, as I had just become a journalism major and was seeking work-related experience.
What I did not expect to find was such a welcoming community that made me feel so quickly seen. I remember my first story was about what fashion trends Aggies wanted to see during the fall, and I was assigned it after explaining my interest in fashion and that I was pursuing it as a minor.
To this day, I look back fondly on my first articles and their pun-filled headlines like “NMSU students are ready to ‘fall’ into fashion” and “Las Cruces Pizza Festival creates history in the baking.”
In 2025, I became the managing editor for The Round Up, and my roles and responsibilities drastically changed. Now, my work no longer just affected or involved me, but the publication as a whole.
Suddenly, my fears shifted from being a staff writer who was nervous to interview strangers to being an editor speaking to a room full of new faces.
My new focus became about how I wanted The Round Up to evolve and be something that I, and others, would be proud to be part of.
None of that would have been possible, though, without me taking that leap in my junior year to become more active on campus. This is something that seems to be changing each year, with 26% of college students taking exclusively online classes and 6.1% of students attending fully online colleges.
While there is a lot of pressure on students to attend school in-person, I cannot, in full confidence, agree that every person should attend classes on their campus. People must do what is best for them mentally, physically, and financially. The only thing I can speak on is my experience and what benefited me.
I found that I could not replicate the college life I wanted for myself in a virtual setting.
Without attending classes in person and being a student at a physical campus, I would have missed out on many of the opportunities I received. Not just The Round Up, but also the friendships I formed and the other student organizations I was a member of, like the Black Student Association.
Despite that, my experience still varies from what people perceive as the typical college student’s due to my living off campus, as according to the American Association of Community Colleges, nearly 16% of all undergraduate students live on campus.
One of the things I learned was that joining clubs and internships gave me a community of students on campus that I felt I was missing. What I wanted, and got, out of my time at college was a student life, student activities, and to grow through experiences with others.
The Round Up was a place for me to learn more about journalism, bond with others, and grow as a person as well as a leader.
This internship has made my time at New Mexico State University feel complete. Similar to a video game where I am trying to earn as many achievements as possible to complete the game at 100%, I feel confident that when I graduate, I will leave with no regrets.
Before I end the game and walk away forever from this newspaper, though, I found myself sentimental and wanting to give my appreciation to all those who have helped me these past few years.
Thank you to my family for supporting me, my friends for helping me brainstorm Gnarlee News topics, my editor for making me a better writer, The Round Up staff for creating lasting memories with me, and you, for reading this.
Writing for you has been one of the joys of my life.
Love,
Marlee Lustig
