When I was in middle school, I, like many others, had several career goals that occupied much of my thinking about the future. My dominant dream, however, was teaching high school English.

Being an educator sounded great to me. I would get to help guide students on their path to professional success and provide tools to help them achieve their dreams.

What I didn’t know at the time was that the real reason I was attracted to teaching was that I wanted to persuade others.

In the infancy of my career planning, when I began to consider the “why” behind my passion for teaching, I was attracted to the idea of making my classroom a place where students could develop wisdom as much as they developed writing skills.

That goal would remain steady until my junior year of high school when I joined the school newspaper, The Kolus.

It was during my time at the paper I realized a better route to making a lasting impact was through journalism.

From my perspective, the foremost responsibility of a journalist is to, in the words of Mr. Dooley, “Comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable.” This means that reporters have a responsibility to empower average citizens and check the authority of those in power.

By acting as a watchdog, writers and photographers can help people make better decisions about whom they vote for, what they buy or what they believe.

It is through this persuasion I hope to continue making an impact on the Pullman and represent the diverse opinions throughout our community.

These principles outline the core objectives of Opinion this semester. To inform, persuade and expose readers to perspectives different from their own in the hope that they might benefit through understanding alternate worldviews.

I hope to cover politics in Whitman County and Washington state as the midterm elections draw closer and offer the section as a resource to advocate for candidates.

Opinion has a unique position within the paper where it can critique and praise organizations and individual decisions on and off campus.

The ability to editorialize events is an important tool alongside objective reporting. It provides context and offers readers a second look into why a piece of news is troubling or uplifting.

In order to accomplish all of this, I need your help. Please, comment on our stories, send in letters to the editor and participate in one of democracy’s most critical features: journalism.

If you feel you are not being represented by this paper, let me know. I will do all in my power to make sure the Evergreen becomes a paper you can trust.

Even if you don’t agree with every word we write.