Refreshing the page for the Boston Globe Magazine, I grew impatient: why hadn’t my article been published yet? Apparently, after just one semester of my 4+1 master’s publishing program, I had developed the gall to even think this to myself. 

Applying to Emerson, I grappled with whether I should major in journalism or WLP. But by the time my parents and I were met with enthusiastic orientation leaders covered in glitter outside of Piano Row, I was content with my decision that WLP was the route for me. I still am, but now I can’t help but wonder (okay, calm down Carrie Bradshaw) if I can envision a future in journalism.

During registration week, I sat myself down and decided the 2021 spring semester was for taking risks. No ifs, ands, or buts allowed; I was now technically a grad student, and I had to act like one. Three of the four classes I’m in are fully out of my comfort zone: textual editing (hate it), writing for TV (meh), and writing for the Boston Globe Magazine (cue sparks flying). The Globe class advertised the opportunity to be “real-life published,” with the help of the professor, a past editor of the magazine. At the very least, I’d be able to hone my writing style. I was stoked. And scared. 

Zooming into the first class from my childhood bedroom (thanks, delayed campus move-in dates), I looked at the impressive, older grad students in front of me and took rigorous notes as my professor laid out what editors for a magazine like the Globe look for from young writers looking to freelance. 

The first real test came when my class was tasked with pitching stories to the magazine for a package on COVID & college. We spent time in class going over ideas and wrote up short pitches for the ones approved by my professor. When the time came, I was assigned to write a piece on college students struggling with a lack of motivation during COVID. 

Now comes the part where I fake it until I make it. 

Tasked with finding people to interview—something I had minimal experience with outside of a piece or two in YourMag—I had to plow ahead to start reaching out to people. Naturally, finding sources in-person is not ideal at the moment, so I scoured university newspapers, Psychology Today, and social media to find four Massachusetts-based students and a Boston psychologist to talk to. The whole process demystified what it means to interview someone for me. Yeah, I one hundred percent was a sweaty, nervous wreck for an hour before each interview, but afterward I buzzed with adrenaline. 

Throughout the whole semester, I’ve confided in my roommate, a literal kickass journalist, when I get overwhelmed or don’t know how to go about something. We’ve already long been each other’s makeshift editors for various school and extracurricular pieces, but now she was also giving me an impromptu, crash course in journalism. I’m cosplaying as a journalist, and she’s helping me get away with it—it’s great. 

In the meantime, I’ve jumped on opportunities to keep writing and reporting by volunteering to do a story about recipe virality on TikTok and agreeing to help a staff reporter contact and interview people for a real estate package he was working on. I shaft all other schoolwork to the side if I have something I can be working on for the Globe course. And the whole time, I know what I’m doing; I’ve done it so many times before. When I was a senior in high school, I focused my energy on AP English, Women and Gender Studies, and lit mag—almost completely ignoring responsibilities like AP Calculus and Physics. Spring semester freshman year the focus was on a chapbook for my poetry final. Last semester, I was hyper-focused on my budding design skills in applications of print publishing. I have a habit of putting everything, besides my penultimate passion-of-the-moment, on the backburner when I find something new that makes me excited to learn or create. 

After a week of refreshing bostonglobe.com (their visits must have been through the roof thanks to me), I gave up and took a night off. I found out my piece had been published along with the rest of the COVID & college package by waking up to an email from my professor the next morning. I still don’t know where my career will take me post-grad, but I’m excited by the prospect of more options.