Like you, I fought to make my English degree work. Here’s the secret I wish someone would have let me in on before I finished college: if you want to write and to have a career in academia, be an English major. If you want to write and to have a career anywhere else, be a communications major. THERE’S where we would have learned about press releases, effective cover letters, headline creation, etc., etc., etc.–in short, the real world language and media skills you and I missed out on while we were studying Renaissance poetry and debating the merits of transformational grammar.

I didn’t have a clue about that then, and I probably wouldn’t have listened had anyone tried to explain it. I was dead set on teaching English, so I never considered anything else. One completely unsatisfying teaching career later, I was finally able to step back and look objectively at what I was missing, then start learning everything I really needed to be successful outside the classroom.

Writers with backgrounds like ours learn to appreciate both worlds. We can write a great press release or a revealing comparative analysis. We are able to adapt to many types of job requests. I harbor no resentment toward the Ivory Towers…I just know now that my professional comfort zone is somewhat closer to the ground.