Where can students publish?

by Karl Olson

Adapted from the May 1996 Techniques, the newsletter of STC's MSU Student chapter. Reprinted from Tieline, March/April 1998.

Students of technical communication are often eager to have their writing published, and rightfully so. Getting published can help get your career going.

But one concern students have is where they can publish. According to Associate Professor Roland D. Nord, a number of publications accept student writings. Technical writers should consider the following:

Technical Communication Quarterly

Journal of Advanced Composition

Journal of Written Communication

Technical Communication

Journal of Computer Documentation

Composing and Computers

Before and After

Upper and Lower Cases

Adobe Magazine

Newmedia

Byte

PC Computing

PC Shopper

Mac User

Mac World

Editorial Eye

IEEE

American Society for Training and Development

Technical Skills and Training Presentations

Intercom

Every one of the journals and periodicals listed above is open to submittal by students. Lack of confidence is the main factor preventing students from publishing their work. They can gauge their writing ability by reading recent publications or visiting the Internet. The listservs Copyediting-1, ISO 9000, SGML-L, Techwr-L, and Viscom contain essential information for future technical communicators.

The World Wide Web is the easiest way for students to publish. It's cheap, accessible, temporary, and their work cannot be rejected. "Traditional print archives have reached capacity," says Professor Nord. "The Internet is going to become more complicated, and we are going to see less for free." The Web is "going to fall into the hands of technocrats (technically educated people)" and will be dominated by commercial Web sites rather than personal home pages. This change calls for the skills of technical communicators who know HTML.

Professor Nord says to "take the best thing (you) have written, and make it available" on the Web.