Hayley M. Howell

ENC 3310

E. Powers

28 April 2014

Cover Letter

My goal throughout this course has been to establish a creative nonfiction section in my

portfolio. Every piece I’ve written has been created and revised with that purpose in mind. My

intended audience has been baseball fans (and by extension baseball industry employers).

However, I also have always boasted that my writing style is attractive to even the most casual

baseball fans (something that makes me very employable), and I used workshops in this course

to test that theory out with even non-baseball fans. I took into account the various feedback I

received but I also paid close attention to publishing standards in my industry and through my

network. The Eulogy to Turner Field was published in my column and syndicated nationally.

The first piece I created, Take Me Out to the Ballgame was a little longer and more personal and

though my editor offered to publish it in my column I’m still looking for the right way to put it

out there. The third project is something I’m going to add more personal photos and videos to as

I find them, and add it to my portfolio to show I can do those types of projects. Internet clips are

becoming more popular than blogs or articles or even radio or tv segments so it’s good to have

that sample in there to show I at least know the basics of how to do it.

I wanted to create a portfolio which is simple and easy to navigate, but could also grow. I

currently use the extensive portfolio I put together in Writing and Editing in Print and Online last

summer and I’m happy with it, but I like having this portfolio as maybe a shortened one just for

creative nonfiction. I included a link to my full portfolio on this site’s homepage as well. I

experimented with a new feature that wasn’t around when I created my original portfolio as well,

the “blog” tool, and I have to say I like how easy it is to use. Newest posts appear at the top

rather than me having to drag the entire page around to get that effect, and I can tag articles,

which is something I do on my tumblr but hadn’t found a good way to do on Wix. I write recaps,

features, and now creative nonfiction and I was having trouble thinking of a way to organize it so

someone who reads my portfolio can pull up what they want to see depending on what they are

hiring for, because recaps are very dry if they’re looking for someone to commentate or write op-

ed style features even, and this tag cloud works for me so far. I may implement it on my main

portfolio as well.

I think a big weakness in my work is taking on too much in a single piece. When you

only publish a features once a week it’s hard to decide what to exclude. I haven’t really had the

time to do much personal nonfiction writing that’s not an assignment or something I’ve pitched

to one of my editors, whether on the sites I write for or the FSView, but it would be nice to sit

down and have the time to work through all of my ideas. I have plans to try to work that time in

over the summer.

I think what I learned in this course helped my feature writing immensely even though I

have to cut back on a lot of the extra wordiness and keep things pretty succinct for my features. I

wrote a feature on The Animals’ Wiffleball and Tequila Picnic Saturday and tried to establish

place through experiencing the picnic, collecting the sights and sounds (this is how I pitched it to

my editor), and it got an entire page spread with multiple color photos. I’m really proud of how it

came out and it really helped me earn some respect from the other FSView writers that I didn’t

have when I was previously just knocking out recaps before I was given this chance.

I’d like to move forward with my writing by continuing to work on my features since I

have recapping down to a science, therefore making me more hireable. I’m not interested in

working for third party media conglomerates but only for the MLB, so I’m really trying to put

together a diverse and polished portfolio I can take to the teams and try to hold out for the

specific job I want.

I attached notes to two of the projects as I saw necessary as well.