As the CRLS community continues conversations about race, discrimination, and microaggressions, we at the Register Forum are having these same conversations within our own organization. We feel that it is our responsibility as a newspaper to moderate and push for necessary, and sometimes uncomfortable, discussions. However, as a growing club with a majority-white staff, we know that reporting on important issues involving our community does not absolve us of addressing our own faults. Difficult conversations are necessary—even when the subject is our own paper.

The Register Forum has changed in many ways since its establishment in 1891. In the past few months alone, we have increased recruitment efforts and worked to diversify our coverage. We have improved our newspaper’s accessibility by going online. But the Register Forum is still not representative of the student body.

We are focused on what we can do now as a student organization. We want to create more opportunities to connect with our peers from all interest areas and backgrounds. We are working with Student Government to hold a second Club Day with the intent of reaching students that the fall Club Day does not reach. We also plan to visit English 9 classes during second semester and upper schools this spring to recruit new contributors. We will continue leading workshops for new writers and layout designers to establish engagement and support between editors and staff on the newspaper.

We hope that students interested in journalism will work with us to improve our newspaper together. We also hope that other clubs at CRLS, new and old, take concrete actions to address their own inclusivity. While talking about microaggressions during the school day is important, school hours amount to only a fraction of the day. Outside activities and extracurriculars are a crucial component of a student’s identity on campus, and failing to ensure these activities are accessible and welcoming to all students is a disservice.

We should not just wait for someone else to implement change when we, as students, have the power to improve our school community. Let’s take advantage of it.

The RF is strongest when we are engaged with our readers. If you have ideas about how we can be a more inclusive paper, we would love to hear from you. Reach us by email at [email protected].

This piece also appears in our January print edition.