How to Use Your English, Journalism or Writing Degree

I remember reading a brochure about what to do with an English or Creative Writing degree while hanging out in Diversity Student Services at Northern Michigan University. And while I read the list of jobs I could get involved in like Criminal Justice, Education, Journalism and Social Work, all I kept thinking was, "I don't want to do any of this stuff. I want to be a full-time author and nothing more." And when I transferred from NMU to LU, I still had writing and English on my brain. But when someone would suggest being a journalist, I immediately corrected them about my goal of being an author instead.

After graduating from Lincoln University in 2003, I came back to Chicago and started working at Walmart, but I distinctly recall the look of confusion when I introduced myself and said I'd just graduated from college. A couple of people asked me what made me apply to be a photo technician when I had an English degree. I told them I wanted to learn more about photo development since I changed my major from photography to Spanish and never got to really learn much outside of clicking a camera.

I volunteered for a local Chicago hip-hop magazine called "Underlined Magazine," which my godmother suggested to me because she knew one of the owners. I liked working for a magazine company, but I needed to be somewhere a lot more professional and organized. The product itself was great, but the meetings were late, people were missing and money seemed scarce. However, with "Underlined Magazine," I got my first chance to interview music artists and attend local events for coverage. That's where I met groups like Poetree. I also found out just how much work goes into writing, layout, editing and promotional costs. My boss at Walmart got his first cover shoot because I introduced him to the owners so it worked out for both of us.

I also volunteered for a St. Louis poetry magazine where I had the opportunity to meet Khari B. and the House of Twang at the Spoken Word Café. But I wasn't happy with that magazine because stories I wrote kept getting pushed back or changed to other groups. There were also typos all over the magazine. I asked if I could change my position from a writer to a copy editor to add more credibility to the publication. For a couple months, I did just that.

I knew I wouldn't be able to work at Walmart long since the pay was low and there were no health insurance benefits so I went back to job searching while volunteering. I became a receptionist at Sedgwick CMS eight months later. But I was asked again, "Why are you answering phones when you have a degree in Writing?" I told inquirers that this claims company paid me nice money to go to grad school at DePaul University while I searched for a job in my field. Plus, I'd decided to move out of my parents' home again after a year and a half. When you graduate, it just feels incredibly backwards to go back home under your parents' eyes. I love my parents to death, but I wanted to be on my own again. The workload with grad school and volunteering for the magazines was too much at once so I stopped volunteering for the magazines.

However, after a year and a half of answering an 81-line switchboard phone and studying whenever I had a break or sat on a Red Line train, I was bored out of my mind. The job paid for grad school, but I liked Walmart better because I enjoyed photography. I didn't think I was learning anything besides answering phones and transcribing claims tapes. So I left. I had no job lineups. I just turned in my two week notice. I work very well under pressure, and I knew that if I stopped looking for convenient jobs and focused on jobs in my field, I'd finally find satisfaction.

A few weeks later, I was hired as a writer for a local Chicago men's magazine called "New Negro Magazine." Working for a men's magazine was fun because I started researching topics I probably would've never paid attention to. I also visited the Black Holocaust Museum in Wisconsin, which I'd never heard of before working for this magazine.

I spent the entire summer at Lake Michigan eating ice cream, typing on my computer, enjoying the sun and living off of $400 every two weeks, but I had rent to pay and was dealing with a bad breakup.

I joined AssociatedContent.com in 2005 and made some reasonable side cash while I finished up the last touches on my first novel, "Change for a Twenty." I'd been writing this novel since my junior year of college, so I was elated to finally let it release. And in 2006 shortly after the first book released, I got a call from the Managing Editor at Kaplan Financial. The editor was impressed with my attendance at her alma mater, DePaul University, in addition to my volunteer work with the St. Louis magazine, "New Negro Magazine," "Underlined Magazine," AssociatedContent.com, the release of "Change for a Twenty" and my degree in writing. Thanks to my editing work with LU's literary magazine "Under One Sun" and the St. Louis magazine, I'd become an okay copy editor.

But when I got to Kaplan Financial, I realized how much I just didn't know. I worked with five veteran copy editors and learned I was not the queen copy editor I thought I was. The St. Louis magazine was good practice, but editing financial and educational material was much more challenging. I worked there for over two years and when the company was bought out, I didn't want to move to La Crosse, Wisconsin. So I was back on the prowl looking for something and hanging out at the lakefront once again enjoying the severance package and some time to work on promoting my second novel, "Round Trip."

In the middle of promoting my second novel, I was frustrated about how low-key newspapers were being with the Jena 6 trial. I'd had a very difficult time adjusting to the racism at Northern Michigan University so I took this Jena 6 trial very personal. I asked for a few days off to go to Jena, Louisiana to report on this trial since I was unhappy with the coverage I was reading from other publications outside of the Chicago Defender reporter who showed up at a Chicago rally for the Jena 6. When I came back from Jena, the reporter bug hit me. I finally appreciated the journalism courses I took at LU and NMU and wrote part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4, part 5, part 6 and part 7 on the Jena 6 case for AssociatedContent. My sudden interest in journalism also made me respect the Chicago Defender for having the only reporter who stayed around the entire time the rally was going on, unlike the mainstream Chicago newspapers and television news outlets. I became a subscriber to the Defender that same year.

I changed my major three times while at DePaul University trying to find another category I liked besides English and Writing. It didn't work. That was the only field I wanted to study, always has been and always will be. I took some superb writing, communications and public relations courses, but I really didn't feel like I needed a master's degree. I was already doing what I wanted to do-writing novels and working with online sites using search engine optimization. I also had a temp. job at Pearson Education proofreading Spanish and English textbooks, thanks to eight years of studying Spanish from eighth grade to college.

But while I was at Pearson Education, I was reading the Chicago Defender heavily. I had never come in contact with a Chicago newspaper that covered African-American news on a consistent basis, and I loved it. I loved LU, but I was still very frustrated with the way I was treated at NMU. For the first time ever, I started really reading newspapers and watching the news to keep up with the latest debates and headlines. That was a huge step for me because before the seven-part series I'd written on the Jena 6, I was very vocal about how I felt the news was depressing and not of interest to me. My family and friends noticed an immediate change and pointed out to me that I might be a journalist after all.

A couple of days after my Pearson Education project ended, I read a Ransom Notes column from the Executive Editor of the Chicago Defender that I didn't agree with about how online bloggers don't fact check their work. Considering I'd gone above and beyond to do so, I wrote a long e-mail to the Executive Editor letting him know I disagreed with him. The next day, he wrote me back, said he liked my writing (my Web site address was in the signature line) and called me in for an interview. I definitely thought I wouldn't get that job when I found out he was the interviewer. How do you get a job when you've mouthed off to the head person in charge? The editor apparently didn't care. I wasn't disrespectful in my Letter to the Editor, but I did site sources. He looked at my writing, my experience with Web site editing during a project with D'PUC Credit Union and my photography background, and I was hired two days later as the Web Editor and Staff Writer.

The best part about working for the Chicago Defender was that all of the skills I'd developed over the years came together. The photography experience was useful for reporting assignments when the staff photographer wasn't available and for editing photos for the Web site. The magazine experience was helpful when I was assigned to interview celebrities and attend events. The transcribing experience made quoting interviewees much easier to do. The receptionist experience helped me network with publicists and field technical calls for those who weren't Internet savvy. The Web site experience was resourceful for improving the Web site and helping to increase the visits from 19,680 to 60,619 monthly visits. The Defender was also supportive of my books and let me blend book promotions with promoting their newspapers while I was at book signing events. And although I decided to resign from the Chicago Defender newspaper for undisclosed reasons, I wholeheartedly appreciate the experience.

I took all of the photography, writing, networking and web experience I'd gotten over the past seven years to become a full-time freelance reporter and reviewer. As much as I like working for other people, I've realized over the years that I'll never be satisfied unless I'm working on my own. I am still a loyal AC Source Writer and became Chicago Now's Message from Montie blogger, Chicago Relationships Examiner, Chicago Fragrance Examiner, Chicago Black Hair & Health Examiner and Chicago News & Events Examiner, too. I was fortunate enough to have all of the publicists and interviewees I worked with in the past support me with other publications. Everybody doesn't have the stomach or the patience to be self-employed, but for those who do, being a freelance writer is an incredibly rewarding experience.

And this year, I was called back for a contracted position with Pearson Education again as a copy editor and educational textbook writer. I can only imagine where this project will lead me next, but what I do know is I love variety, working for different clients and being my own boss. Even with previous positions that weren't in my field, all of the companies helped me in my writing journey. It took me 24 years to realize that being a full-time author is not what I want my end goal to be. I just want the ability to touch different people in various categories through word. Like my homepage Web site image explains, I live to write.