Call for Applications: Humanities EXCEL Fellowship with Lookout Santa Cruz, Editorial Fellow — 2024-2025

We encourage work-study and non-work-study students to apply. This role requires work authorization.

Application Deadline: September 12, 2024

The Humanities Division and The Humanities Institute are excited to announce an experiential learning opportunity for undergraduates at UC Santa Cruz to work with Lookout Santa Cruz.

The Humanities Experiential Career Exploration and Learning (EXCEL) Program connects Humanities majors and minors to organizations in the community for paid internships. In this cohort program, EXCEL Fellows gain practical experience and professional training while learning about positions outside of the university that build on their studies in the humanities. At the same time, community partner organizations benefit from students’ assistance and academic expertise. EXCEL Fellowships carry on the success of THI’s Public Fellows program, and they foster positive collaborations between the campus and community, demonstrating the value of a Humanities degree for a range of careers.

About Lookout Santa Cruz

Lookout Santa Cruz is the region’s largest news company and is quickly becoming the go-to news source for thousands of readers in Santa Cruz County. Our newsroom of 10 counts 140 years of collective experience, providing excellent mentoring opportunities for the fellowship applicant.

Founded by news analyst Ken Doctor, Lookout’s innovation is being watched around the country — both for its mobile-first local news product and service and for its business model, borrowed from the New York Times and scaled down.

Our digital-only, mobile-first modern media products — including across social media, newsletters, email, text alerts, forums, and events — drive our fundamental mission: to serve Santa Cruz County with a new and higher standard of news, information and community engagement.

Position Description: Editorial Fellow, Audience Engagement

Are you curious about digital journalism and passionate about connecting with the community to tell the stories of Santa Cruz County? Duties will vary based on the interests of the applicant and the needs of the newsroom, but fellows may have the opportunity to work closely with various members of Lookout’s editorial operations, including reporters, editors, photographers, and our production team. Learn the art of digital storytelling by assisting with social media and audience development. Curate and create engaging content, both on our website and social media. Manage our community resources and databases, such as our public events calendar, and work with our production team to ensure Lookout stories are distributed widely. 

Those with an interest in reporting and writing could have an opportunity to work on stories and opinion pieces. Fellows who have a passion for the English language, including fact-checking, grammar, and spelling, could gain experience in editing. 

RESPONSIBILITIES AND EXPECTATIONS

• 60% — Draft and curate editorial content to be published on our website and shared within email newsletters. Including but not limited to event recommendations, Ask Lookout, Briefs, and other community news updates.
• 30% — Create social media content that engages our readers, builds our online following, and shares important information across our channels. 
• 10% – Solicit feedback from readers and members on ways to improve and fill any gaps in our coverage

What we’re looking for in a candidate:

• You are a declared major or minor in a department in the Humanities Division and are in good academic standing. If you are currently proposed, you can declare by the end of the academic year in June. [required] 
• You have work authorization. [required]
• A passion for local news and willingness to learn, try new things, and give and receive feedback.
• A curiosity about issues affecting the local community and events across Santa Cruz County.
• An obsession with accuracy, attention to detail, and meeting deadlines.
• Digital and social media experience or a willingness to learn. 
• Experience creating written or visual content for an online publication.
• A self-starter who appreciates an in-office work environment and can work independently, collaboratively, and proactively to identify new ways of reaching digital readers and topics of interest to a local audience. 

Bonus points for:

• Published journalism experience, including online or student publications or freelance.
• Bilingual English/Spanish proficiency.
• Interest in or experience with SEO.
• Interest in or experience with data visualizations, including sourcing and mining data sets.
• Interest in finding local stories and engaging with readers online, including platforms like TikTok and Threads.

Internship Term: September 2024–June 2025

Hours: 10-20 hours/week

Compensation: $20/hour

Location: In person at Lookout’s office 1523 Pacific Ave. in downtown Santa Cruz

Mentorship: You will report to Lookout’s Senior Director of Partnerships & Audience. The partner supervisor will delegate tasks and review your work, provide coaching, and help you understand what working in this field is like. You will meet to check in at least once per week

Apply By Submitting

1. Your resume 
2. A short cover letter (no more than one page), answering these questions: Why are you interested in this position? How does your academic expertise and skillset prepare you for this role? What are you hoping to gain from this opportunity? 
   1. For this position, please specify any journalism experience in your cover letter (including journalism-adjacent experiences, like essay-writing, interviewing people for research projects, and creating digital/social media content), or your general interest in journalism.
3. Writing samples (ideally published journalistic work, but class assignments or communications work you’ve done will be acceptable).

REVIEW these resume and cover letter resources to ensure you are a strong candidate! 

Once the application window closes on September 12th at 11:59pm, there will be an interview process with top candidates. This job is expected to start as soon as possible in September. 

APPLY NOW

Note that there are three different Fellowships at Lookout Santa Cruz this year. Information about the Editorial Fellow, Audience Engagement position is available here.

Please contact Assistant Director of Experiential Learning Kylie Rachwalski at hum-experiential-learning@ucsc.edu with any questions.

The Mellon Foundation, The Helen and Will Webster Foundation, The Humanities Institute, and the Humanities Division generously support the Humanities EXCEL Program.