Creatives on the right path with magazine module

Two English and Creative Writing students at Coventry University demonstrated how effective their ‘Writing for Magazines’ module was by getting their coursework published.

Sabrina McClune’s ‘Halls vs. Commuting: Battle of the student habitats’ was published in Student Wire and Maria Omena’s ‘What love is and what love is not’ was published in Thought Catalog. Maria also won a poetry competition run by Writing Times in March after her lecturers gave her the confidence to enter the competition.

The ‘Writing for Magazines’ module focuses on improving students’ employability. It involves writing a feature article for submission to a magazine, presented in the style and format of the magazine’s submissions guidelines. On top of the final piece, students were assessed on their understanding of the magazine’s submissions guidelines and process. 

As well as their piece for publication, students in Coventry wrote an article on ‘a student night out’ and compared their work with students writing the same thing in New York. They then completed reflective work on how their own writing styles compared to published travel writers.

Maria Omena said:

To be honest, I couldn’t believe it when I received the email saying I won the competition. I thought it was a prank, and I thought the same when they said my article had been accepted. It’s been a dream of mine for so long!

 

Most of all, I don’t think I would ever had sent it to the online magazine if my lecturers didn’t provide us with all the tips, and most of all the confidence boost. Besides the content I’m learning, the most important thing the course team taught me was to be daring and believe in myself. I’d say it changed my whole perspective of writing and now I’m seeing the results of it. I have nothing else to say but thank you.’

 

Sabrina McClune’s piece can be found at https://studentwire.co.uk/halls-vs-commuting-battle-student-habitats/ 

Maria Omena’s published article can be found at http://thoughtcatalog.com/maria-omena/2017/03/what-love-is-and-what-love-is-not/

And her poem is published at http://www.writingtimes.co.uk/leap-of-faith-by-maria-omena