The pursuit of excellence is always spurred on by competition, as it is the key to reaching your highest goals. This is because without competition, growth becomes stagnant and the necessity to strive in attaining your highest goals eventually disappears. The lack of competition in any area?academic, personal or professional?breeds complacency and a complete lack of growth in obtaining excellence.

If there is any lesson to be learned from this school year it is that competition should always be embraced. Without competition, none of us would be pushed to do better. Without competition from the Support US slate, VISION would have simply settled for the spray painted signs they started off with. The organized “Smurfy blue” signs that the slate soon adopted would have never appeared without that competition.

Without the competition from two other slates, those running in the elections would not have been pushed to do so much in their campaigns to get people excited and involved. The effects of this competition were a highly competitive and exciting election.

Not too bad of an outcome, especially considering that this competition is sure to extend well into next year with the creation of quasi political parties and advocacy groups that will fight for their beliefs.

We all strive to do better, especially when the stakes are raised. And if it takes someone else to point that out, all the better. Don?t look at competition as the enemy, as they are the force that drives you to do better in everything that you do.

Don?t settle for just alright, or just good enough. Embrace competition, or when you are confronted with the ability to do so, become the competition. Take what you have been given, and if you can?t make it better, start off with something new.

…On a personal note, I would like to thank the following people for all the love, support and advice they gave me over the past year in editing the opinion section: Jennifer Winford, Skyler and Todd Wonnacott, the staff of The State Hornet (with special thanks going to Ryan and Andrea for putting up with my crazy leftist views), Derek Reis, Ellen Tomson, the Okamoto brothers, Justin Gerbitz, James Guzman, Ashlee Romero and the E-Bar family of the Nordstrom Rack.

And who can forget David Sommers, Brian Roberts, Crystal Chase, Hans Weichhart, Shara Perkins, Liz Markey, Brooke Yeager, Jason Bryant, Shaun Lumachi, Thomas Hunt for keeping us distracted, anyone who has ever offered words of encouragement (including the guy who compared me to Hitler), ANDY! (my wrestling competition) for keeping it real and everyone who ever took their time to read what I had to say.

Brendan D. Wonnacott is a Government & History major and is opinion editor of The State Hornet. He can be reached by e-mail at [email protected].