Start Your Journalism Career at PolicyMic
Have you ever wanted to publish an op-ed in the New York Times, Huffington Post, or Wall Street Journal?
Becoming the next Tom Friedman or David Brooks is definitely an art form, but there’s also a science to writing an effective online political journalism op-ed, and we at PolicyMic believe we’ve found the secret recipe for success.
Journalism has entered a new phase in the digital age; long gone are the muckracking days of Upton Sinclair and Jacob Riis, when straight investigative reporting sold papers. Today, understanding Google search trends, mastering TweetDeck, and becoming a social media expert (Facebook, Tumblr, Storify, etc.) is essential to maximize your views and help your story to go viral.
That’s why we have developed a Political Journalism bootcamp to give you the tools you’ll need to write powerful and persuasive political journalism in the new media environment. With challenges and competitions every week to keep it exciting, we’re trying to make news and politics fun and cool for our generation.
PolicyMic is a rapidly growing platform news & discussion platform for millennials. Think Twitter meets the Economist. I co-founded the site with Chris Altchek, a conservative who previously worked in the Bush White House, as a way to engage our generation in high-quality debate. The concept is simple: Users award one another Mics for thoughtful comments on articles. As you get more Mics from the community, you’re able to write more, unlock new features, and build a following. Once you’ve received enough Mics to level up to a “Pundit,” you can work with our editors and publish an op-ed on our homepage.
If you participate in the bootcamp, we’ll give you the opportunity to work with our editors to publish articles and make your writing technically sound, persuasive, and most of all, engaging to read. By the end of the 7-week course, you will have a body of polished work to add to your resume, as well as experience with a growing media platform. We’ll teach you hard journalism skills, including: writing a strong lead and thesis to grab your reader’s attention; mastering Google trends and analytics to generate compelling story topics and optimize your headlines for Google search; using social media effectively to promote your article via Facebook and Twitter.
Whether you’re looking to become a professional journalist, you want to work at a think-tank, or you’re ready to advance in the world of public policy, learning to write concisely and effectively is an essential skill. Indeed, because of the exposure they have received on PolicyMic with our over 200K readers, some of our contributors have already begun making a splash. After young conservative Matthew Swift wrote a piece entitled, “Newt Gingrich is Playing the Politics of Desperation,” he got picked up by Fox Business and had the opportunity to debate Juan Williams on national television. Libertarian pundit Robert Taylor wrote a piece calling for more free-market solutions to our education crisis, which got republished on Glenn Beck.com and The Blaze. Young Middle East scholar Anna Day won the opportunity to debate Former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice after receiving the most Mic’s on a debate on U.S. foreign policy.
We’re looking for more free-market thinkers to participate in our bootcamp, and believe this is an invaluable professional development opportunity. If you are interested, I highly encourage you to apply (Email me at jhorowitz (at) policymic.com). Looking forward to meeting all of you!
Jake Horowitz is the co-founder and editor-in-chief of PolicyMic. Follow him on Twitter @jacobdhorowitz