Guest Blogger Julia Thomas

My internship at Marie Claire and experience working in New York has played a tremendous role in allowing me to fully experience how a monthly magazine functions and what working there consists of. In my time at the magazine from May to August, I had the chance to witness three issues of the magazine through the stages of production and conduct research on a wide variety of topics, ranging from human trafficking in North Dakota to college drop outs, to breast cancer and emerging entrepreneurs. I also had the chance to meet with different editors to hear about their work and attend a Marie Claire work panel to learn from staff members about how to prepare and perform in the professional work place. And, on a more informal level, I got to learn from women who are incredibly talented and passionate about what they do, and willing to share their experiences.

Much of the internship centered around projects and tasks that we were given on a daily and/or weekly basis, but the internship also provided my fellow interns and me the opportunity to pitch article ideas to MarieClaire.com. In doing so, I gained firsthand experience in submitting pitches, reporting and writing an article, and working with a web editor to see the piece through to publication. This opportunity to pitch and publish a piece on the magazine’s website was a fantastic chance to expand beyond the work I did in Features to online material.

Though my work at Marie Claire, consisted primarily of research, fact checking, writing, transcribing interviews, and immersion in the Features department, I also had the chance to work for MC’s Tech Editor and fill in as the Assistant to the Editor-in-Chief of MC. I worked one day a week for Marie Claire’s Tech Editor and the Assistant to the Creative Director, primarily writing drafts of online, tech related stories, researching the latest tech products to feature on the magazine’s tech page, and writing copy (captions and headlines) for the tech page. In doing so, I gained a clear idea about what goes into a single page of the magazine and how to creatively present a product. The other interns and I worked collaboratively to research and think about different themes, and I learned so much from working with a group to put together a single product to present to the editor. We had to work efficiently and think fast before deadlines as a small team, which was a really valuable, and often times really fun, experience.

At Marie Claire, in New York, and in the media industry, you have to stay on your toes. There’s a constant need to be aware and thinking about deadlines, to be conscientious and connected to the people around you and what’s being talked about. I learned about this first hand during the full week I spent working as the Assistant to Marie Claire’s Editor-in-Chief Anne Fulenwider, when her assistant was on a vacation. I was asked to fill in for the position, much to my delight and utter surprise, and learned from the assistant how to do her job, which consists of managing Anne’s schedule, ensuring she has everything she needs at work on a given day and things stay on time, and generally serving as an extra brain for her super packed days. In working in the assistant’s position for a week, I was able to see the wide spectrum of things both she and Anne do on a weekly basis: I set up meetings, gathered together editors before discussions in Anne’s office, and did research and general organization to prepare for upcoming issues, meetings, and each day’s schedule.

Working for Marie Claire this summer was truly one of the best experiences of my life, and I’m incredibly thankful to the Scripps College community and Ms. Linda Davis Taylor for supporting me in taking this amazing opportunity at Marie Claire in New York. I would not have been able to do it without you, and feel that I’m returning to Scripps with a fresh take on my career, new excitement about living in New York one day, and passion for feature writing and digging into new topics.