Dear Bishop’s,

When I first joined The Tower staff, I didn’t understand how publishing works. Specifically, I didn’t understand why my articles weren’t getting published. What I have come to learn, three years later, is that unlike a math class where you will turn in your test either way and your teacher has to grade it, or an English paper that, regardless of how many errors, you will get a grade, any given article doesn’t have to be published.

What separates The Tower from many other other adventures on the Bishop’s campus — and I can say this with a lot of confidence because I’ve tried a lot of different activities — is our standards and our upholding of these standards.

In fact, more often than not, you will write or think of an article that may never come to fruition. In the beginning, this frustrated me to no end — I felt like a hamster on a wheel. I couldn’t understand why the editors didn’t just publish good enough. That’s a trend I see amongst a lot of Tower staff; the writing or reporting can’t be “good enough,” it has to meet all the standards. As I’ve gotten older and have published more articles than I can remember, this attention to detail and drive towards excellence is one of the things I love most about The Tower.

Every issue, every article, every photo, and every last little detail is thought through, discussed, and evaluated. Some may think that we don’t have time for that but as anyone who has been on staff can attest, it is true. This issue is not the exception.

Sydney Chan (‘24), in an editor meeting, described this issue’s theme: “Bam, these are our ideas! Here you go, world!” And we all laughed but none of us disagreed. This issue is one that is thought-provoking and interesting.

With that, I’m really proud to bring you this Issue 06! Lucy Marek (‘25) carefully weighs the harms and benefits of having gendered divisions in award shows, and with the recent wave of anti-LGBTQ legislation, maybe it’s increasingly important to talk about how we see, honor, and respect people.

Looking more broadly at government and the way we have come to understand it, Sydney Chan (‘24) brings you an op-ed about the importance of independent thinking. As well, Ben Brown (‘25) wrote a wonderful op-ed about the importance of transparency in democracy and how, in this modern era, it is an almost impossible goal. David Lai (‘25) – one of our most dedicated writers — contributes an article analyzing using technology before sleep is well-interviewed and thought-provoking.

Love, Leila Feldman Editor-in-Chief