I have two jobs and an internship outside of my classes at uni. One is the typical uni job, a retail gig where I make money for the bills. The other two are both based at websites.
When I was younger and considered getting into journalism, I thought I’d end up working at a magazine or newspaper. Now my dream job has shifted more into media production, but I think even if I did still want to work for Vogue or the NYTimes, I’d need serious web skills. Everything has a website now, and most print publications have corresponding online sites. It’s not enough to just be able to write anymore, you have to be able to use WordPress and know HTML and SEO. There are whole new skill sets out there to be utilised and competed over.
It’s a little intimidating, but I’m lucky to have found these jobs and internships to help me learn outside of the classroom. One of the websites is based on WordPress, and I have an incredible boss who teaches me to use all of the web skills I need. At the internship I’m working as the communications coordinator for a non profit, so I help make sure the message we send out is cohesive across all platforms and that the rest of the communications team is on the same page. It’s great getting to work in real world situations and apply the skills I’m learning in class, but sometimes I wonder if ten years from now we’ll have a new medium, and we’ll have things to learn all over again. The communications industry is such a fluid and ever-changing one, who knows what we’ll need to know in a few years? We’ll have the opportunity to keep learning about our field for the rest of our lives (hopefully).
