Category Archives: Rachel

Expert for a Day

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At college, every day we’re pushed to look towards the future. To consider what classes we have to take for our major. To apply for an internship that will push us to the next step in our career. Even something as simple as eating dinner has to be planned in advance here, with friends to be texted, a cafeteria to be chosen, and limited hours to do it all in.

At times, the future can be overwhelming, so this weekend was a welcome chance to spend some time thinking about the past. It’s hard to believe that more than a year has already passed since I flew down and saw Scripps for the first time during the JES (James E. Scripps) Scholars Weekend.

Just one short year ago, I was mostly silent on the bus ride from the airport to campus; too shy to try to forge connections with people I wasn’t sure if I’d ever see again. Today, I talked more than anyone else in my group of scholars, hailing from places as varied as Austin, Texas and Baltimore, Maryland.

This year I was the one answering questions, not asking them. I reassured scholars that, yes, there are guys on campus; I astounded them by commenting that actually, this sixty degree weather is pretty cold for us; I entertained them by pointing out the cupcake stores and the best boutiques on the drive through the village.

Last year, I was in their shoes, stressing about my interview with the professor who would become my adviser and, this semester, my Core teacher. Now, I find it strange that the constantly smiling Scripps professors ever intimidated me. Last year, when the admissions workers asked my major, I spurted out a top ten possibilities list. This year, when the prospies quizzed me, I calmly responded, “English dual major with Gender & Women’s Studies.”

Admittedly, I still had no answer when one girl from Chicago asked me what my concentration is, but I’m only a freshman. I’ll wait for another year or so to fly by before worrying about the answer to that question. In the meantime, I’ve learned that when stressing about the future, sometimes the best thing to do is to think about the past, because that, at least, is something we’re all experts in.

Doing my Part to End the Gender Gap

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The facts surrounding the gender gap in the professional world have been drilled into my head repeatedly through attending Scripps and through my regular reading of online feminist media like Jezebel and Feministing. However, despite my disgust with the information I was reading and my desire to take action, I had never absorbed the statistics I read as applying directly to me.

My brain had somehow compartmentalized the gender gap information into a folder of interesting information that didn’t affect my life. My career, my dreams, my goals, they couldn’t possibly be limited by percentages quoted in articles.

I never paused to consider that each factor in those percentages was a career full of hopes and dreams just like mine until I read “Promote Women: Use Your Network to Solve the Gender Gap” by Ann Friedman and Amanda Hess (an article posted on Good News, which I discovered via Feministing). This article focused directly on the media industry – the exact field I’m looking to enter – and indirectly referenced statistics from the Women’s Media Center, which found that the media world is overwhelmingly male, and the gap is only growing.

However, instead of sharing the statistics and moving on, like I had allowed myself to do so many times before, the article placed me (and every other reader) in the center of the problem, stating that, “Reading big statistics, it’s easy to place yourself in a bystander role. You acknowledge that women are underrepresented in your industry … You know that they are far less visible, and probably paid less, than men of equal experience. You’re frustrated … But what have you ever done about it?”

The article then walks readers through steps to help alleviate the gender gap. First, think of three women in your industry who are under recognized. Then, think of three powerful contacts in your industry who could assist them. Finally, email the influential professionals and recommend your female friends.

Admittedly, it’s not an overnight solution. It’s not even a solution I can contribute to at the moment, as I’m lacking in influential friends. But it’s a solution that can work.

For now, I’m going to take advantage of the process by forgoing the middleman. In my search for a summer internship, I discovered that I’m only two degrees removed from an education writer at the San Jose Mercury News. When I found out they don’t offer traditional summer internships, I was going to let the chance for contact drop. Now, I’m preparing an email to initiate communication. Because, who knows? Maybe she’ll be the professional who knows a professional who can help me do my part to help end the gender gap.

Resisting the Pool

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Sounds of splashing and giggles and blasting Lady Gaga drift in through my window, tempting me to venture out into the ideal California sunshine. It’s rather difficult to force myself to stay in my desk chair when my dorm room has a view of the field house pool, tantalizing me with the promise of bikinis and boys and beautiful palm trees.

Moments like these are what make me bitter about internship applications. Why should I spend hours working on applications, hoping they’ll earn me a chance to do more work, hoping that work may help me find better work later? And by better work, I mean work that actually pays. But alas, this is the twisted world of the job market.

I don’t want to be brainstorming more snazzy synonyms of “hardworking.” I don’t want to spend an hour reformatting my resume into a new, attention-grabbing design, only to decide it looked cleaner the first way. I don’t want to debate if some of my high school achievements are impressive, or just juvenile. That is not how I want to spend my Friday.

But I do it anyways. Why do I do it anyways? Why do I work so I can work so I can work more? In what world is that what I want?

Strangely enough, it’s this world.

To remind me of that strange fact, I reach for the binder of clippings on my bookshelf. Inside is every article I’ve written for my high school paper, the Los Altos Town Crier, where I interned last summer, and The Student Life here in Claremont. That binder is proof that what I’m working for isn’t just the opportunity to work more – I’m working for the right to create, for the joy of creating, for the rush of knowing people read what I write.

I work every day for the special days, the days when the story I wrote about my Grandma’s stroke gets published and she and all her friends in her rehab facility know that their story was told. I work for those days when my writing makes someone’s life even just a little bit better.

Because, at the end of the day, all lounging at the pool would get me is painfully sunburned shoulders. (No, I don’t tan.) If I stay inside, work only interrupted by the few times I lean too far back in my desk chair and am temporarily certain I’m about to fall to my death, I may not have as much fun. But the feeling of printing out something I’ve written – whether an obscenely edited resume or this very blog post – well, that feeling beats poolside fun any day. That pride, that sense of accomplishment, that sense of purpose – that is what I work for. I work to work to work because in working, and in writing, I am reminded that I am here for a reason.

So, for today, here at my desk is exactly where I want to be. Tomorrow? Tomorrow I’ll go to the pool.

 

LinkedIn (Or, Feeling Like my Mom on Facebook)

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In terms of social networks, I’ve never wandered beyond Facebook. Tumblr seems like a time trap, and I’d rather leave Tweeting for the birds. But it wasn’t until registering for LinkedIn that I doubted my ability to understand them.

I got confused on the second step of registration. Is my home zip code school, or my hometown? And step five completely threw me off: What’s my industry?

I scrolled through the options, and what kept running through my head was… I’m supposed to pick one of these? The last choice, writing and editing, seemed most accurate, but not particularly official. Newspapers was an option, I’ve worked at several, but magazine journalism or online blogs are more my style. Does that make me in Online Media? But oh, I love Libraries, and I haven’t ruled out Marketing… and what exactly does Media Production entail?

It was time to call in the expert.

“Mom?” I said as our Skype call connected. “Remember that time when I taught you what tagging was for on Facebook? It’s time for you to return the favor.”

For the next hour my mom patiently taught me all the tips and tricks of the website. No, you don’t have any friends on LinkedIn– you have connections.  No, the art camp you worked at three years ago isn’t relevant. No, the picture of you in your bikini at the beach isn’t appropriate for your profile. (Okay, that one I figured out on my own.)

Despite the frustration of learning the LinkedIn interface, I came away with not just a better understanding of the website, but also a better understanding of how to market myself. I selected my most important achievements, linked to the articles I’ve written that demonstrate my versatility, and came away satisfied. Satisfied with my profile, and satisfied with all that I’ve achieved so far in my career – things I hadn’t even thought to be proud of until I laid them out for the world to see.

In that spirit, I entered my e-mail into LinkedIn’s search engine to see if there was anyone I wanted to invite to join my network. And then I somehow selected the setting that invited every contact in my address book. Which includes everyone I had ever emailed. My high school gym teacher, a realtor I’d interviewed last summer for an article on the role of Internet in real estate, even the Scripps alum who interviewed me for my Scripps application.

I guess I’m not an expert quite yet. I’ll have to take it one step at a time. And my next step will be searching through the help section to learn how to rescind an invitation.

 

P.S. Thank you, Mom, for being my first friend – er, “connection” – on LinkedIn.

 

“Oh, you’re an English major?”

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There are two common responses when I say I’m an English major: “Do you want to be a teacher?” or “Ah, so you want to work at Starbucks.”

While I can respond definitively that no, I don’t want to work as a professional barista forever, teaching is a less black and white career choice for me. I’d love to teach, but I feel like I’ll need quite a few more years learning before I can take on that responsibility.

To that, there’s only one response: “So, what do you want to do?”

I’ve never understood why “What don’t I want to do?” isn’t an acceptable answer.

I want to be a writer. That much is clear. In terms of my day job, I’ve considered journalism, publishing, editing, really anything that will allow me to get my opinions out there in the medium I love – the written word.

A little less than a year ago, I was deciding between starting my new life at Scripps or at Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism. One of the (many) reasons I ultimately chose Scripps is that the field of journalism is changing rapidly. With new technology constantly shaking up the industries I’m interested in, how could I possibly be certain a position I want would still exist by the time I graduate?

For the most part, I’ve accepted that I can’t be sure about my future until the future of the fields I’m looking at starts to settle down a bit. And then I stumble across an article like “Not All College Majors are Created Equal” from the Washington Post. (An article that, by the way, I read after Facebook informed me a friend had read– further testimony to the adjustments newspapers are making to stay relevant.)

“I have this game I play when I meet college students,” columnist Michelle Singletary declares. Her game is, based on a student’s major, guessing if they will get a job upon graduating. “An English major with no internships or any plan of what she might do with the major to earn a living? No job.”

I would like to point out that any major “with no internships or any plan” will likely fail to get a job, but the fact remains that English majors are most doubted. And such public declarations of doubt, especially when made by someone working in a field I’m considering, don’t do much for my confidence in my dreams. Or, should I say, my confidence that I should give myself time to choose my dreams.

Nonetheless, for now I’m sticking to the appetizers in the metaphorical meal of my career. I did an internship at my local newspaper last summer; maybe a publishing house will be next. This way, when it comes time to order my main course, I’ll know what’s on the menu, and I’ll be ready to feast.