There’s something about a fresh semester that puts a little pep in your step. It’s another blank page ready to be filled with the good (new teachers, classmates, interesting subjects), the necessary (long lines in the financial aid line, paying rent deposit-sized sums for textbooks) and the parking debacle that plagues the first two weeks of class. And sometimes the pages become filled with the bad — perhaps failing grades, family crises and the plethora of problems that pop up to stop you in your tracks.

Despite it all, most of us keep on going, balancing work, school and family. It’s not easy. As we all know, the struggle is real.

I have reached my fourth semester, and barring some unforeseen circumstance, will be leaving City College behind when spring ends. It’s a bittersweet time. As a slightly older student who found her career path in television news early, I chose to go back to school when I came to Sacramento in August 2014 for a better-paying position in a higher market. I signed up for classes a week after I arrived, knowing it was now or never.

I hid my student status from my employer for some time, having come from an environment where work came first, and that was that. Eventually, as my reasons behind scheduling conflicts changed from “I had plans,” to “Well, I’m actually taking this class,” I realized that my coworkers were incredibly supportive.

Colleagues offered to trade schedules with me, giving me the ability to be more involved in school. My boss pored over the schedule, working to fill my place when others couldn’t. Soon, attending classes became non-negotiable. My boss knew (and still knows) my class schedule better than I do, often reminding me of holidays.

Along with this came support from my teachers in the journalism department, who have also made generous exceptions for my hectic schedule.

Without the generosity of these people, I would not be here.

These lessons over the past year and a half have led me to a renewed belief in community, the idea that an outstretched hand can often lead to so much more.

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I was on campus Sept. 3, 2015, the day the shooting of Roman Gonzalez shut down the campus, turning the once-bustling environment to a surreal concrete desert, filled with the faces of fearful, wide-eyed students wondering if they were about to be the victims of a massacre.

After the evacuation, and the realization that the shooting was isolated to a small group, many went about their business. Still, others decided to do something.

The City College Student Senate (whose president you can read more about on page 3) and the Clubs and Events Board hosted a Safety Day Jan. 28 in the Student Center. The Senate even lobbied at the Capitol to push for a mandated safety day across California community colleges.

This is what college is about — learning to stand for something — and it’s what makes a community, and a community college, so important.

A few days after the shooting last September, I walked with then-vice president and current interim president Michael Poindexter (you can read more about him on page 5) as he greeted students waiting in line to get free ice cream. He was asking students if they felt safe, engaging them in an open dialogue about the shooting.

I have never felt unsafe on the campus and still don’t. I find the campus and its students to be a wonderful mix of diverse people, and I wouldn’t have it any other way.

So during this, my last semester on campus, I’d like to thank you all for making my time here so incredible. I look forward to bringing the news of the campus to you, along with my colleagues at the Express in print and at saccityexpress.com. I hope that you, too, have people in your life to offer outstretched hands and open arms.