black&write! Indigenous Onscreen Editing Traineeships 2012

This post has been written by one of the fabulous Indigenous Onscreen Trainee Editors, Sylvia Nakachi.  Sylvia is one of two trainee editors working with black&write! in 2012.

For those who are wondering - Onscreen editing uses the tools available in word processing programs to edit text, and in the black&write! program the trainee editors are learning about editing fiction manuscripts along with lots of other exciting stuff!

This year in 2012 I have had the opportunity to do Onscreen Editor training with black&write! at State Library of Queensland. It has been a very wonderful and worthwhile experience and I am truly honored and blessed to be one of two selected for the trainee editors position. Even though it seemed like a slow start, eventually the team and I got into the mode of editing. It has been an absolute pleasure to have done a week’s training with Kamisah from Broome who was also selected to do the traineeship. We both completed our training in Brisbane at SLQ, under the teachings of Dr Glen Thomas and Craig Bolland who are lecturers from the Creative Industries faculty at the Queensland University of Technology – Kelvin Grove Campus and Joanne Holliman who is a well-known editor and writer. In such a short and intense one week of training, I was able to learn how to proofread manuscripts, do reader’s reports, learn about the different genres, and be trained in applying the correct punctuation and grammar to manuscripts in a fun and exciting way. Since this sort of work was unfamiliar, this has made my traineeship more exciting, allowing me to step out of my comfort zone into the unknown and unexpected. I have also found myself to delve more into doing research work when working with manuscripts. I found that my research work has enabled me to learn and gain more insights into the writer’s manuscripts and it personally gave me access to new knowledge and information. Truly love this editing work with a passion.

Since completing the training, my mind has been exposed to a whole new world of creativeness in the editing world. Being part of very small team with black&write!, my weekly consultations with Linda, Ellen, Sue and Katie have been great. They monitored my weekly progress, helping to nurture my editing skills and allowing me to put knowledge into practice. I am always given great feedback in my progress and in anything that I do with black&write! – thanks beautiful ladies. Since my encounter and connection to this editing world, I have been on a journey of creative thinking; I am unlocking doors to opportunities that are allowing me to do more work in the areas of the creative industries and in my local community. All I can say is that when this trainee editor’s position came across my path, it bought with it opportunities and an entry into the creative world I have and never knew existed in my life, they all came alive, where they once stayed dormant behind locked doors.