Whether you're a Write the World alum or simply someone who loves to write, we hope that passion stays with you for life. No matter where your writing takes you—journaling, storytelling, professional work, or creative exploration—we want to support your journey. Here are a few ways to keep writing a meaningful part of your life.
Keep Writing on Other Websites
If you’re looking for other platforms where you can share your writing and exchange feedback with others, here are some ideas to get you started. Please note that we are not affiliated with these platforms. We encourage you to check them out and do your own research before joining.
- Underlined: Discover new books and connect with fellow book nerds and authors.
- Reedsy: Countless prompts and resources to plan, draft, edit, and typeset your book.
- Wattpad: Popular for fanfiction, romance, sci-fi, and young adult writing. Great for building an audience.
- Medium: For essayists, bloggers, and thought leaders. Focuses on nonfiction, personal essays, and articles.
- Vocal Media: Offers themed challenges and monetization options. Great for personal stories, poetry, and fiction.
- Commaful: Visual, bite-sized storytelling platform with a strong poetry and short story community.
- Scribophile: Critique-based writing community where writers exchange feedback to improve.
- Royal Road: Focused on serialized fiction, especially fantasy and sci-fi.
- Archive of Our Own (AO3): Fanfiction platform with a strong, respectful community and tagging system.
Starting (and Keeping!) a Writing Practice
The best piece of writing advice is both simple and wise: Write every day. Or nearly every day. But with all the other demands on your precious time, how can you carve out and protect a space for regular writing? Treat it as a practice, dear writers. Just like sports or music or art... or anything else that takes diligence and commitment to improve.
Here are some tips to hold yourself accountable:
- Set yourself a schedule or goal. Whether it’s an hour on Tuesdays and Thursdays, 30 min every day, or 2,000 words a week, set yourself a concrete goal and stick to it.
- Take yourself seriously. Tell yourself—every day—that you are a writer. Tape it to your mirror. Sing it from the rooftops. Write it into your resume. Stay home on a Saturday night to draft your next chapter... and feel great about it. Nobody is asking you to be a writer; this is a gift you are giving to yourself. Now honor it.
- Find where you write best. Sometimes, a brilliant idea seems to arrive to us like a gift. But we must have the space in our lives to invite these ideas in, and tend to them. Writing with regularity in the same place is part of this invitation. Perhaps your words flow best sitting at the corner desk in your bedroom, or at a local library or café—find the spot that makes your writing synapses fire, and go there! Sitting down at your writing place will signal to your inner editor and muse that you’re ready to get down to business.
- Form a writing group. One of the best parts of Write the World is that we write with each other rather than alone. Recreate this sense of community for yourself. Invite a small group of peers, whose writing and feedback you value, to meet every month. Exchange work ahead of time, and provide the same careful peer review comments and edits that you practiced on Write the World.
- Make time for reading. Almost all published authors say that they learned their craft by reading . . . a lot. You can read almost anytime and anywhere. Whether it’s before bed, on the train, or at a favorite café, make time to absorb the brilliance (and techniques) of other writers.
Write at Your University
If you’re headed to university in the future, there are many opportunities for you to get involved in writing on your campus! Many colleges and universities have the following:
- Lit journals: Students can submit their writing or artwork and/or join as staff members
- Creative writing workshops: Often open to both creative writing majors and non-majors
- Student newspapers: Be a staff writer for your student newspaper if you’re interested in reporting, op-eds, film and book reviews, and more.
- Writing center tutors: If you want to keep up your editing and peer-review skills, see if your school’s writing center has student tutors or advisors to help other students on their papers.
- MFA in Creative Writing: Many universities offer graduate degrees in creative writing.
Writing in Your Community
Start or join a writing club, or search for one near you! Check with your local public library to see if they host or know of creative writing groups.
Writing-Related Majors and Career Paths
If you want writing to be part of your working life, there are many career paths you can choose from beyond those of an author or a freelance writer. Here are some ideas to get you started. If you’re interested in any, check with your college career center and your advisor to make sure you are getting the education you need to embark on these careers.
- Marketing and Communications: Marketing and communications jobs involve representing an organization, business, nonprofit, government entity, and more through the written word and media. You use language to get your message across to the right audience in the most effective way possible.
- Journalism: Journalists write for newspapers, online publications, and magazines. In addition to reporting, journalists can write reviews, personal essays, interviews, cultural criticism, and much more.
- Copywriting: Copywriters come up with the words used in advertisements, including those for digital, print, and television.
- Technical Writing: Technical writers create instructions and guides for websites, software, and much more. They turn complicated ideas into easily accessible language that everyone can understand.
- Science Writing: Science writers communicate for or about research, hospitals, and other STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math) organizations.
- Law: The world of law is one of written words. The ability to write clearly, intelligibly, precisely, and persuasively is a necessity for lawyers, who write laws, legal briefs, legal memos, and much more.
Publishing
Why not try your hand at publishing in lit magazines or online journals? Just remember, many famous writers have received more rejections than acceptances! We recommend doing your research on publications before submitting to make sure it accepts the kind of work you write. Here are some possibilities to look into.
Literary journals: Though often for more established writers, literary journals publish a variety of writing, including poems, short stories, essays, and review. Below are just a few of theat journals that accept writing from younger and emerging writers, and if you do an online search, you’ll find many more. As always, do your research before submitting to make sure the journal in questiony publishes the type of work you are passionate about.
- Adroit Journal: “The journal has its eyes focused ahead, seeking to showcase what its global staff of emerging writers sees as the future of poetry, prose, and art.”
- The Louisville Review: “Each poem and story submitted to TLR is judged entirely on its own merit whether the author is already nationally known or previously unpublished.”
- Phoebe: “phoebe prides itself on supporting up-and-coming writers, whose style, form, voice, and subject matter demonstrate a vigorous appeal to the senses, intellect, and emotions of our readers.”
- Popshot: “A literary magazine that champions new writing across the globe.”
- Aaduna: “aaduna seeks to uncover new and emerging creative visionaries, especially people of color, in the realm of fiction, poetry, non-fiction, and the visual arts.”
- Glass Mountain: “We currently accept previously unpublished submissions from any undergraduate or emerging artist (anyone who has not attended, graduated from, or is currently enrolled in an MFA or creative writing Ph.D program).”
Websites: If you write personal essays, reviews, or cultural commentary, there are a large variety of websites you can pitch to. Before doing this, research the publication you’d like to pitch to and how the pitching process works.
Seeking more opportunities for a career in creative writing? Head to our blog Creative Writing Careers: Exploring Future Prospects for Aspiring Writers to learn more!
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