This is a guest post by Donna Reish. Learn more about her from the author bio at the end of the post.
For anyone looking to improve their skills as a writer, simply attending college is a great step. English major or not, you will be writing so many papers that your skills will have nothing to do but improve. Of course, depending on your goals, you have quite a few decisions that will definitely impact your experience and your skills as a writer.
Of course, taking English courses will help. Especially if you are looking to improve your skills in creative writing, English courses are a must. Studying the greats who crafted language into canonical works of art is an invaluable experience. You will learn new and interesting techniques with language, and you will better understand which stylistic choices work best for a given situation.
Most colleges also have creative writing concentrations for undergraduates, giving young writers the opportunity to implement a variety of techniques and literary styles. Many creative writing concentrations also have workshop components, in which you and your peers edit each other’s work provide feedback. This group editing experience could be invaluable for young aspiring writers.
If you are interested in blogging, a lot of courses in many colleges require starting up or continuing a class blog. While most blogs will probably be course-related, it is still a very good experience and a way to at least get your feet wet in the blogosphere. Many communications courses study or practice blogging, so the communications department is a good place to start looking for blogging-related courses.
Many communications or English departments also offer courses in specialized types of writing, like magazine writing, newspaper writing, screenplay writing, poetry writing, or fiction writing. Some schools, like the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, also offer technical or scientific writing courses, which can be very useful when looking for a job right out of college. If you are still choosing a college, it is really beneficial to ask departments (most departments have contact information online) if they offer courses on any specialization writing.
In addition to studying different genres and fields of writing, college is also a good opportunity for a writer to simply study anything that interests them. While this sounds simple and obvious, many writers tend to study only their craft, which in some ways limits their ideas and even verbal flexibility. Studying a variety of topics will give writers a ton of ideas and writing material. It can add degrees of complexity and insight to a story or essay and allows the writer to make interesting connections and unexpected metaphors.
Author Bio:
Donna Reish, a freelancer who blogs about best universities, contributed this guest post. She loves to write education, career, frugal living, finance, health, parenting relating articles. She can be reached via email at: donna.reish13@gmail.com.
An awesome site for writers called Creative Writing Now honored me by asking me for an interview. In the interview I discuss how I became a freelance blogger and I provide my tips for experiencing success with blogging.
You can read it here.
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