As an editorial intern, you will be assisting with a variety of editorial tasks in regard to many of the publications listed above, from researching to editing to proofreading to distributing publications. A major portion of your job will be related to helping prepare, publicize, and disseminate BYU Speeches.
Primarily, your assignments will consist of:
1. Second reads
2. Proofreading
3. Copyediting
4. Source checking
5. Fact checking
6. Checking out and returning books at the library
7. AB reading
8. Running campus errands
9. Assisting with social media efforts
This manual will detail the basics of what you need to know to perform those tasks in regard to Publications and Graphics publications. Working one on one with department editors, you'll see firsthand the techniques they use and the processes they follow to ensure BYU publications are of the highest quality. As your internship progresses, your fellow editors will become more and more reliant on you and your developing skills. Your unique perspective, skills, and experience will be a welcome addition to our team.
Your goals
We want you to feel like you are as much a part of directing your internship experience as those you work with. Within the first few days of your starting your new internship, a supervisor will sit down with you and discuss what kind of experience you hope to have. Things to be thinking about prior to that discussion are:
- What are your career interests? What is your ideal job?
- Would you like your internship to familiarize you to a wide variety of processes and procedures, or would you like to spend time focusing on becoming adept in one or two areas?
- Are there any specific softwares and skills do you want to become proficient in?
- What do you hope to have learned here when your internship concludes?
As you go through your internship, remember to ask for samples (either in print or PDF form, or both) of the projects you work on so you can build a portfolio that you can present to potential employers.
You will need to be proactive in this—because you will work with multiple editors, it will be up to you to work with each on obtaining final copies of the work you assisted them with.
Remember that it's a lot easier to get samples soon after the project is finished than it is to dig one up several weeks or months down the road.
With the high volume of publications that go through the shop each week, you'll be suprised how quickly you forget what you worked on even a few days earlier, so it's a good idea to jot down throughout your internship not only what projects you worked on but also what role you played in helping prepare each for publication.
