The Fresno City College Rampage has been a fixture on this campus since 1949. But what is it that its team of hardworking men and women really do for the student body?

As members of the press, it is the responsibility of the Rampage staff to deliver to you the news you need to know, but what is news you need to know?

With limited staff and newspaper space, it is impossible to bring you every piece of information you need to know, so we are tasked with making hard choices. Sometimes the Rampage even comes under fire because we point out things others wish we hadn’t.

In the first issue of spring 2012, the Rampage dropped a bombshell on the student body. For the first time, the student population was made aware of possible cutting of summer school. Did the Rampage single-handedly cause the district to change their minds on that possibility?  No. We did it in tandem with the student body. We did it with you.

The Associated Student Government mobilized, with a copy of the Rampage in one hand and a petition in the other. The two organizations, and the student body of course, caused so much of a stir that the district agreed to continue having a summer school program.

Once problems are broadcast on the front page of a newspaper, the powers that be tend to handle the issues with a little more urgency since they know people are watching.

The job of the press is to bring important issues to the students, and then let them act. Once we’ve printed a story, we leave it to the students to do something about it.

Also in the spring of 2012, FCC’s accreditation was put on “warning.” If FCC lost its accreditation, anyone that ever had a degree from the college would no longer have a valid degree. Additionally, we’d all have to transfer to a different school because these classes would be rendered meaningless to our educational progress. That’s kind of a big deal. The Rampage called out the district for lacking a plan which led to this warning.

Without the Rampage, most students wouldn’t have even known there was a problem, much less known what accreditation was.

Last semester in issue five we printed a controversial story regarding the conduct of several members of the ASG at a student government conference.  Some thought it was wrong of us to put their personal activities on the front page of the newspaper; some thought it made the Rampage seem like a gossip tabloid.

The importance of this story may not have been obvious to everyone, but it was important.

The most crucial role of press is to keep government honest. That’s why freedom of the press is included in the First Amendment along with freedom of speech.

Not only did the ASG spend more than $10,000 of student-paid money to attend this conference, but it had also recently removed one of its own senators and trampled all over his First Amendment rights.  If the leaders we’ve elected have no sense of professionalism and responsibility, then who are they to tell this senator that he is ethically bankrupt?

The ASG cleaned its own house with resignation after resignation. Since then, all but three accused members have resigned. Senators Richard Alvarez, Jose Chavez and Nathan Squire, remain, and we’re watching patiently to see if ASG members remembers that said they would seek their removal.

As a minor epilogue to the ASG saga, the senator that was removed, James Demaree, was reinstated after an appeals committee deemed that ASG’s removal process violated his right to a fair hearing. It came full circle: Demaree was reinstated, while the executive board in ASG who lead the removal process against him all resigned due to their actions, or as they call it, “personal reasons,” as any good politician would.

The role of the press is not to create the news for the students, only to report it. If there is a story you think is negative about you or your organization in the paper, always remember that we did not make it negative, you did. We do not make the news, you make the news, and we are watching.

It may seem cynical, but we are not paid for what we do. The countless hours we put in go unrewarded with monetary gain. Pride in the finished product is our only reward. Even the grade in the class we take seems minor when you compare it to seeing the newspaper on distribution day.

We are the Rampage. Made by students; made for students.