I remember chatting with a friend back in Nov. 2019 about how excited I was to have won Old Gold & Black’s Halloween horror short story contest, and how I hoped that would get my foot in the door for a potential job with them.
As I was having this conversation, we were approached by a young woman sitting nearby who introduced herself as Allison Sherman, managing editor of the Old Gold & Black. She told me applications would be open soon and that I should apply, which boosted my confidence tremendously.
This upcoming January will mark a full three years of my employment, and somehow I find myself near the top of the totem pole as managing editor – after applying for the position, of course.
At the end of my sophomore year, I applied for both managing and copy editor, and those positions ended up going to Chalmers Rogland and Sarah Peak, both of whom deserved it way more than I did at the time.
However, come junior year, the position I dreamed about having someday the whole way through finally was placed in my hands via an email from our adviser, Drew Timmons.
I cried only a little bit, like a mature adult.
Nowadays, a lot of my job is reading a handful of articles every couple of weeks, some of which make me audibly gasp at how surprising the subject matter is.
During the process, I get to have some fun and educational conversations with our staff and contributing writers and think up super cool pitches for articles.
While I worried early in my employment that I’d be lumped into the “snakey journalist” boat by my peers, I’ve found that people have been overwhelmingly supportive and generally understand the effort OG&B puts in to respect its contributors and shy away from too much bias.
In addition, because I’m not involved in Greek Life, I’ve been able to find a similar sense of community in the staff of OG&B instead, as well as through my job as copy editor of the Bohemian and as a student assistant in the library.
Since I started here, I can recall numerous moments I look back on and smile, such as the infamous hamster article, giggling like crazy with Julia Allen in the pub room, writing some pretty controversial Old Black & Blue articles and Brandi finding out Cameron and I have been dating “this whole time?!” (and, of course, I’m not in charge of editing his stuff; that’s Julia’s job).
Since it’s Thanksgiving season, I thought I’d give thanks to the job that has been a huge source of entertainment, friendship and growth for me for the last three years. It’s so much fun to scroll through my page on the website and read all my past articles, and then stop before I get to freshman year so I don’t cringe.
It’s also been so much fun to watch the rest of the staff grow and change over the years, particularly the seniors that I arrived at Wofford with when we were so young and naïve. That extends beyond just OG&B; I’m so impressed with many of the seniors as I see who they’re becoming.
Of course, the year isn’t over yet, and I have an Interim abroad in Rome and a spring semester full of English and art history left, as well as a semester of articles both written and edited.
With that, I have to thank the many different versions of OG&B I’ve worked with over the last few years, as well as the super-cool girl group of an editing team we have this year, during Thanksgiving 2022.
As well, I’d like to thank all the students, staff and faculty who have contributed incredibly educational and interesting interviews over the years, as well as took the time to read each of our issues—we couldn’t do it without all of you!
