By Peyton Chandler
Undergraduate students have their sights set on one thing following graduation—finding work. Regardless of their major, the job market and career opportunities are top-level concerns of college students. Graduating is a huge milestone in and of itself, but as the professional world changes, preparing for and understanding the expectations of a specific field is of equal importance. Professional Writing is a major that has seen exponential growth and popularity in recent years. With numerous media outlets and fields that pertain to writing in a professional setting, those who graduate with a degree in Professional Writing are sure to find satisfactory jobs, right? I sat down with Jessica Thuston, Executive Editor at Southern Living Magazine, to discover not only the process by which she became the Executive Editor of the fifth largest national magazine, but also to better understand opportunities for writers in the job market as it now exists.
Having graduated with a degree in Journalism from Southern Methodist University and spending a year at Northwestern attaining her Masters degree, Thuston was well established by the time she finished school in 2002. Since then, the writing field has seen significant change. Thuston began searching for work in an age where newspapers were the dominant medium for journalists. Like many student writers, Thuston was initially unsure of her career path. She explained, “You may not know what type of writing you’re interested in until you try a lot of different genres.” She even spent time as an intern at the Washington Post, where she realized that writing in the political sphere was not her passion. Instead she discovered an interest in magazines. “I got into magazines through a program at Northwestern that dealt in magazine publishing. It wasn’t that daily deadline that you see with newspapers; you can get into a specialty. Sometimes in newspaper and other areas of writing, the more seasoned you get, the more writing you do. Whereas I feel like in magazines it’s reversed. The more seasoned you are, you’re editing more peoples’ work.” Once she became exposed to magazine publishing, the focus of her career shifted to editing. “I have definitely shifted to where I don’t write as much anymore, but I edit a great deal of writing. Editing writing is very important no matter what you’re doing—getting to the point, being brief.” She dealt with uncertainty prior to finding a concrete direction for her writing. Reaching the title of Executive Editor stemmed directly from her interest in magazines.
Having gathered all of this information about Mrs. Thuston’s career and the way it all came together for her, I became curious of her thoughts about the changes that have taken place in the field of writing since she first dove into it. Obviously, the immergence of new technologies has paved the way for a completely new field. However, there is much more beneath the surface of the obvious that has created new opportunities for aspiring writers. I read aloud a brief description of the Professional Writing major as it is listed on UAB’s website. She was excited to hear that this major is being offered to students, and she even went into detail on how it seems more beneficial than other writing majors, including her own. “I will say Journalism as a major, which I love, is very focused on just the media outlets, newspapers and things of that nature. But I really think there is a broader application that could go beyond into other fields, and it sounds like UAB understands that with this major, which is great.” But how should Professional Writing majors feel about the job market itself? When asked, Jessica explained that students should feel really great about finding work. “Especially because of the way it’s been broadened with this major. You’re really marketing yourself to more than just one specific niche. When I was schooled, you had to pick early what you were going to do. I think that has changed in the job market. The digital world has been changing everything, which is something we have focused on here at Southern Living. I feel like that is translating to college students looking to jobs with writing. There are so many more opportunities now. So I think people should feel really hopeful, but it is a very competitive market. You have to be good and hone your craft.” It seems that in 2014, Professional Writing students ought to feel as well equipped as anyone to begin and retain an exciting, successful career.
