Spenser Smith

From photographing northern pygmy-owls on the mountainsides of Vancouver Island (see cover photo above) to writing long-form articles on harm reduction (see publications below), I have a wide range of skills and experience.I've managed and edited a nationally distributed literary magazine, written content and produced videos for non-profits, and published my writing extensively (including in Maclean's, The Malahat Review, Prairie Fire, and The Puritan). I currently lead Special Projects at Island Crisis Care Society, a non-profit that provides housing to people in crisis, and operate Birds and Bark, a wildlife photography business.

As a part of my ongoing studies, I am participating in an internship program, and am actively seeking a work placement in a field related to philosophy.

About Me

Literacies

I have set several goals for myself, both short term and longer term. I find it helpful to break big goals into smaller, more measurable pieces that build towards a higher plan.

References

I am a fu

Resume

Outside of work and my school commitments, I have less time than I would like to be able to contribute to my community, so my engagement has been more limited to simple things like contributing to bottle drives for a local U-13 lacrosse team, or helping with teaching with a few local cadet groups.

Signature Assignments

Back to About Me

self-reflection tool like this, I think I’m in a good place.

I'm a recent graduate of the Creative Writing BA from Vancouver Island University, where I focused on the writing and editing of short fiction, through regular submissions, with a peer review process. While I am enhancing my communication skills through my work at Shaw, I am highly motivated to break out into the publishing, writing, and editing industries.My focus remains on young adult fiction, particularly within the LGBTQ community.

urrently attending Vancouver Island University and will graduate with a Bachelor Degree in Creative Writing, with a focus on fiction, editorial and publishing. My education has included three counts of professional editorial training, and four counts of fiction and creative non-fiction publishing. In 2015, Broatch started her degree at Vancouver Island University. Since she has worked as a Fiction Editor for Portal (2017/18) and is the Managing Editor this year (2018/2019). She is also the Features Editor for The Navigator Student Press, which celebrates its 50th year in print in 2019. Her fiction has appeared in Portal's 2018 issue; her nonfiction has appeared in the online magazine Incline, and is routinely in The Nav.Broatch lives in Nanaimo, in an apartment next to the water, with her fish Elvis.

Brooklynn Hook 3rd degree connection3rd English Honours and Creative Writing student at VIU | CRF and Program Housing Caseworker Nanaimo, British Columbia, Canada

I'm aiming to work in

ourth year Creative Writing student at Vancouver Island University. I love reading, writing, reporting, and editing, and hope to work in the publishing industry after graduation in 2019. I have a particular interest in fashion, beauty, lifestyle, and pop culture, and am always looking for opportunities to intertwine my passions with my writing and editing skills. ... Show

About Me and Contact

I’m also on the search for a fun and quirky cook book to cook my way through, so if you have any suggestions drop me a line through my contacts page!

Who Am I?

Signature Assignments

Resume

Professional Philosophy

Home

About Me and Contact

From photographing northern pygmy-owls on the mountainsides of Vancouver Island (see cover photo above) to writing long-form articles on addiction (see publications below), I have a wide range of skills and experience.

About Me

Designed

I’ve sharpened my creative thinking by reimagining assignments.

Harm reduction: Keeping substance users safe 

Professional Statement

About Me

n sit on a log and cry

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VIU Graduate Attributes Literacies: Reading engages, situates, and analyzes a text in order to comprehend and make meaning. Readers learn to understand how texts are culturally and historically situated, to interpret using a range of genres, and to appreciate that there are different ways to approach a text. Here is a sample of a review series I had attempted to create. Due to a lack of time, discipline and Good Reads, it hasn’t carried on. However The Elegance of the Hedgehog was one of the first reviews I had written, and it was written because of a conversation in the class it was assigned in. Being my second year, I had read it and immediately made judgments based on taste. What the discussion taught me, however, was the vast ways that a book can be read.  Written Communication is the use of writing to organize perspectives, knowledge, thoughts, ideas, and information and to present them in a clear and effective manner. Adept writers are able to negotiate different genres and situations. During my education at VIU, I have developed skills in many genres of writing: horror, romance, mystery, young adult, memoir, and flash fiction. While I am most comfortable with the long, overdrawn sentencing of literary fiction I enjoy dabbling in flash fiction as it gives the writer an opportunity to do away with the conventions that are ingrained in us. “Premature” is a story that was conceived for a short fiction class, and include it because as I read it I recall how much fun it was to write and how afterward, it completely shifted my appreciation for short fiction. I think that it was the beginning of my absolute love for the short form. Flash Fiction   Intellectual and Practical Skills: Creative Thinking occurs when established approaches are reimagined in order to arrive at a new way to represent or understand a subject. Creative thinking is characterized by a solid grasp of established practices within a field of study, by use of imagination and synthesis, and through initiative and risk-taking. Editing Exersize My experience as a fiction editor has forced me into realizing the many ways to tell a story, and the structures it can take on. As a practice, when editing new pieces, I theorize ways that structure and form can be played with. Rearranging chronologically could make it stronger; a perspective change could be more emotionally charged; withholding information could make the reveal more poignant. Of course, it is rarely ever needed as the author’s know what works for their story best. However, the exercise has transferred into my own writing: playing with time, perspective, and truth. Above is an example of a short story that was edited to adjust the chronological order of events. It is experimental in nature and challenges structure.     

Social Media                

(if you were unaware, we don’t have whales in northern Alberta)

Class members’ blogs, photos, and bios.

Organizing

I’m unsure if I believe in such things, but if I were too it would only make sense for me to live up to it. A Ceilidh, a gathering of people that would result in stories, and dancing, and singing. As a result, it’s a personal pleasure when I come across writing that borders oral tradition. The history and the importance of tradition excites me.

If I were able to create a future in a magical ball, it would be one filled with red pens and illustrated indie magazines. One that is dedicated to guiding first-time authors through the editing process and into publication. There is an appetite in the community, I think, to reflect different kinds of existence. Narratives that are achievable through brightly colored paintings and drawings and prose dripped with enchanting emotion.

(Warning: I’m a bit of a mouth-breather)

About Me

About Me

Goals and Next Steps

To see all of the VIU Graduate Attributes, please follow this link. VIU Graduate Attributes

Signature Assignments

Resume

Civic Engagement & Other

Now, I strike out into the world with a strong sense of my own strength and the desire to write and create more.

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Professional Philosophy Statement

About Me

About Me

About Me

YA

Resume

My Letter from the Editor that was published in the 2018 edition of Portal is an example of this attribute:

Sample Work

I also want authors and creators to succeed when they ask me to edit their work — making others proud of their stories is something I pride myself of.

Courses

3rd year Creative Writing major and Sociology minor at Vancouver Island University. Through my work, I consider myself an emerging disability activist driven by the need for justice and equity of all disabled people.

A lot of things have happened in my life since the first time I celebrated IDPWD two years ago. I started to tell more people that I’m……

Goals

VIU Graduate Attributes

If you take anything away from today, let it be this: Educate yourselves. Assess your abled privilege. Google something about Disability. Anything. Read it. Myself and many people I know in the community are tired. Google it yourselves for once.

About Me

Social

Everybody makes mistakes