College students have become victims of unpredictable violence in recent years with recent shootings at Virginia Tech and Northern Illinois Universities. College newspapers, via the Internet, have served as a vital site for getting important information out to inform students, parents and the world of the situation while attempting to minimize harm.

We send our condolences to the friends and families who lost loved ones at both Virginia Tech and NIU, and hope SF State will never experience such a sorrowfully inconceivable crisis.

But if one did arise, we don’t feel confident the university could deliver important information to students in a timely fashion, given our current relationship with this administration.

For readers out of the loop, SF State President Robert A. Corrigan and the [X]press staff have rarely talked over the past few years, and it seems the president either feels he has been burned by this student newspaper one too many times or he is too busy to comment. Whatever the reason, it has become apparent that over his nearly 20-year tenure at SF State, quotations bearing his name have grown fewer and fewer and gathered through secondary sources.

Recently, President Corrigan’s medium for his messages to the SF State community has been full-page advertisements in this newspaper. While we don’t mind cashing the checks, we want to remind Corrigan that it would be ideal to get his comments about issues on a week-to-week basis, but it is paramount that we are assured we have his utmost cooperation during any incident that poses a threat to our student body.

Currently, all information from the administration—from the police to the Office of the President and beyond—is funneled through one campus spokeswoman. This setup is barely adequate on a slow news day, both for the spokeswoman and us.

With the immediacy of the Internet, we take our job seriously in updating readers with accurate and vital information. If such a situation were to arise at SF State, we would like to present concerned individuals with facts as they develop and provide students — who may only have access to a laptop — a Web site that has answers to their questions. Cooperation from all facets of the campus is necessary in obtaining and presenting such information.

To be fair, we know that it is a rare week when these pages don’t contain criticism about Corrigan or his colleagues, but we are asking that we work through our differences to make certain we can minimize harm during an emergency.

Right now, campus police won’t even speak with us about day-to-day crime on campus. In December and January, President Corrigan rejected requests for a sit-down with our editors.

An understanding between the administration and [X]press needs to be reached.

This is something that cannot be pushed aside. Let’s sit down and discuss these issues. It is the least we can do.