Personal Statement

Purpose Statement: This blog post is a personal statement about myself and my qualifications for the internship at Simon & Schuster.

Ever since I learned to read when I was 2 1/2 years old, books have been my passion. I spent my childhood reading and rereading my favorite books, and writing my own, and I’ve never stopped. I have had some professional experience with both editing and writing, and I hope to be able to learn more in this internship.

I am a fast and accurate writer, with typing speeds of around 93 WPM. I regularly achieve As in my English classes, and I often write for myself in my spare time. As part of my high school senior project, I began the process of writing a children’s book. Due to time constraints and extenuating circumstances, I never finished, but I was guided through the storyboarding process by a professional mentor. Heidi Schulz, a New York Times bestselling author, who has had three books published so far and many years of experience, taught me some of the processes of planning, storyboarding and writing a children’s book. This experience would be very helpful as a jumping-off point for the internship, having some background knowledge into what it is like to work as an author.

I have always had a passion for editing, including looking over my friends and siblings’ essays and correcting minor mistakes for them. Typos and grammatical errors pop out to me, whether I am reading a book or a text or an internet forum, and I am adept at fixing the issues that I find. My most recent employment was as an “Assistant Writing Fellow” for the LIBA 100 Freshman Writing class, where I got to put my editing skills to good use. I assisted underclassmen in planning, writing and editing their papers, as well as helping the teachers lead writing workshops among the students. This not only heightened my ability in editing, but helped me improve important soft skills such as communication and quick thinking. All editing interactions with students were in an online format, which has given me competency with using Zoom professionally. The formal editing experience I have received, along with my natural proficiency for it, would fit well with the editorial department internship. I would not only be able to use the skills that I already have, but work from there to gain more experience and knowledge into editing professionally.

I have a large amount of relevant experience for this position, and I am a quick learner who is eager to continue learning about editing and publishing as a career. My skills in writing, editing, and communication make me a good fit for this internship, specifically in the editorial department.