Fondness For the Friends

At the beginning of this week my supervisor asked me to begin and coordinate a long-term project that would enable anyone to search online for milestones published in Friends Journal (birth, death, wedding announcements). The project involves indexing the necessary information from each milestone—such as name, event type, date, and issue date—in an excel worksheet, which will eventually be made into a searchable database on the journal’s website. I spent most of Tuesday figuring out what information to include, how to organize it, and how to solve any problems that came up as I began entering data (for example, I realized that for a marriage announcement we needed to make a separate entry for each spouse).

Once I was confident in my excel skills I showed the other interns what I had been doing. It’s a pretty mindless, tedious task and I felt a little guilty asking the other interns to participate—I also tend to shy away from group work after some negative experiences in the past. But everyone was willing to be involved and now almost all of the interns are working on a decade of milestones—it’s something we can each work on for short periods of time between other projects. I really enjoyed showing other people how to work on the project and I liked being able to answer their questions and problem solve with them…I guess there’s something to this collaborative learning thing after all!

This week I also got to pick some poems for the September issue. Friends Journal keeps a lot of poetry submissions on file, so I looked through for poems that would complement the feature articles or relate well to the season. My picks are certainly not the final say on what will actually be published, but it was fun to give my opinion. Friends Journal does a great job of including interns in the publishing and editing process. Although staff members make the final decisions, they are very open to input from interns in choosing articles, editing, formatting and designing an issue, and marketing. It feels like they really take an interest in my learning experience.

On Thursday I met with the publisher/executive editor of the journal to interview her about her experiences in the publishing field and my amazement at the interest FJ staff members take in their interns was further enforced. She talked with me for over an hour, asking me about my own background before I even began interviewing. She answered my questions thoughtfully, describing her journey to her current position, the challenges and joys of her job, the qualities and skills she feels are important for success, and her predictions for the future of publishing. A lot of her thoughts have stuck with me since our meeting; her emphasis on flexibility and creativity in running a small publication, her firm belief that there are many useful applications for a major in English, the parallel she drew between special events planning, theatre, and publishing, her belief that the technology of ink on paper will never be obsolete, and finally her trust that God is leading us all and that we just can't know what's in store for us.

Before I started at Friends Journal I didn’t know what it would mean for me to work at a Quaker journal. I wondered what it would mean in terms of workplace values, the content I would read, the people I would meet, and how it would compare or shed light on my own beliefs. I'm discovering that it means working in a friendly atmosphere where my opinions are valued and I am trusted with actual work; reading articles that encourage nonviolence, understanding of other cultures, seeing good in others, and showing compassion; meeting people who care about the work they do; and finding that although I don’t agree with all Quaker practices and ideas, I can see a great deal of value in the a lot of them.