Spring 2025
Careers for Creatives: Unexpected Opportunities
The Careers for Creatives: Unexpected Opportunities Journey is perfect for mentees and mentors who are looking to turn their passion for storytelling, content creation, or journalism into a career. Through a dynamic online course, mentoring sessions, and live networking events, you will explore various career paths available to writers today, learn practical skills to help you succeed, and discover how to build a sustainable career that aligns with your interests and strengths. Discover career paths in finance, technology, corporate communications, publishing and more!
Girls Write Now Collaboratory
This Journey Is Closed, but You Can Pre-Enroll in a Fall 2026 Journey Now!
Learning Objectives
Apply to Join
Deadline: January 15, 2025
As a mentee or mentor in the Careers for Creatives: Unexpected Opportunities Journey, you’ll have access to an online course designed to help you learn skills to bring into interviews and networking situations. You’ll be paired with a mentee or mentor for one full cycle, and you’ll meet with them at least once each month. You’ll attend at least one community engagement experience a month and are encouraged to attend monthly Career Chats in which you will meet with professionals from a variety of industries.
- Cycle(s) Spring 2025
- Time 3 hours per month
- Areas of Focus Career Development, Networking
- Requirement Attend at least one Career Chat per month
- Available Spots Per Cycle 20
Careers for Creatives: Unexpected Opportunities Course
Through a combination of lectures, industry insights, practical exercises, and interviews with professionals in non-traditional writing fields, learn how to apply your writing skills to a variety of emerging and unconventional careers. You’ll also gain a deeper understanding of how to adapt your writing style for different mediums, develop a tailored portfolio, and market yourself in industries you might not have thought were open to writers.
Careers for Creatives: Unexpected Opportunities Mentoring
Mentees and mentors in the Careers for Creatives Journey will be matched for one cycle. Pairs will meet for at least one hour-long session each month.
Careers for Creatives: Unexpected Opportunities Community Experiences
Mentees and mentors in the Careers for Creatives Journey must attend at least one Community Experience per month. They are encouraged to attend the following monthly Career Chats:
- March 11, 2025: 4:45-6 pm ET
- April 8, 2025: 4:45-6 pm ET
- May 6, 2025: 4:45-6 pm ET
Career 360 Adventure
The Careers for Creatives: Unexpected Opportunities Journey is a part of the Career 360 Adventure.
Journeys in the Career 360 Adventure focus on finding and keeping employment that fuels and inspires. It is perfect for mentees and mentors who are looking for a new job or want to make the most of their current role.
Find Your Journey
Find Your Journey
Lead Community Change (Part 2) (Spring 2027)
Lead Community Change is a dynamic two-cycle Journey that harnesses the transformative power of storytelling to drive social impact. Aspiring young leaders and activists will unleash their creativity to develop and implement innovative community-based social activism projects, supported by GWN’s rich storytelling resources.
Indigenous Poetry (Spring 2027)
Explore the rich traditions and contemporary voices of Indigenous poetry. Mentees and mentors will read and discuss poems by Indigenous poets that reflect identity, culture, land, community, resilience, and storytelling. Alongside close reading, participants will write original poems inspired by these works, experimenting with imagery, voice, form, and personal expression. Through discussion and creative practice, they will explore how poetry can honor heritage, preserve stories, and illuminate both personal and collective experiences. Mentees and mentors will take away a deeper appreciation of Indigenous poetic traditions, strengthened creative writing skills, and a greater understanding of poetry as a tool for connection and expression.
Journalism: The Art of Profile Writing (Spring 2027)
Every person has a story to tell, and profile writing offers a way to share those stories with the world. In this Journey, mentees and mentors will learn how to build trust with subjects, conduct respectful interviews, and maintain the writer’s role as observer rather than confidante. The Journey emphasizes a holistic approach that considers subject, writer, and reader.
AI & Technology: Protopian Futures (Spring 2027)
This Journey explores the evolving landscape of artificial intelligence and emerging technologies through a protopian lens—focusing on how innovation can be intentionally shaped toward more equitable, creative, and human-centered futures. Mentees and mentors will examine the possibilities and limitations of AI, engaging in discussions and hands-on explorations that highlight both current applications and future potential. Through critical reflection and creative experimentation, mentees and mentors will consider how technology can be designed and used to expand opportunity, deepen connection, and support more just and imaginative ways of living and creating. Mentees and mentors will strengthen their critical understanding of AI and emerging technologies while deepening their perspective on ethical innovation and human-centered tech practices.
Explore Tour (Spring 2027)
Explore Girls Write Now’s creative and storytelling pathways through a multimedia, multi-genre experience featuring mini courses, exploratory studios, and one-to-one pair sessions. Develop skills across fiction, journalism, publishing, video, podcasting, visual storytelling, and more.
Independent Study (Spring 2027)
Create your own experience with our Independent Study Journey. Mentees and mentors meet as a pair, attend events of interest, and use coursework to support creative projects and personal goals. Along the way, you can connect with others during a mid-cycle mixer designed to spark inspiration, share ideas, and build community. The Journey culminates in a showcase where participants present the work they have developed throughout the cycle and celebrate their accomplishments together. Mentees and mentors will benefit by gaining greater independence in their learning, deepening their creative practice, and building meaningful connections while pursuing self-directed goals.
Teach GWN (Spring 2027)
In this Journey, members of the GWN community will develop curriculum and facilitate a Community Studio for one or more cycles within GWN’s Collaboratory structure. Each cycle involves facilitating three Community Studios, one per month. Mentees and mentors will gain valuable skills in leadership, teaching, and community building. Mentees and mentors can facilitate a Community Studio either independently (if they are 18 or older) or together as a pair.
Everything Is a Story: Nonfiction that Reads like Fiction (Fall 2026)
In this Journey, mentees and mentors will explore the ways in which creative storytelling techniques can be applied to nonfiction writing of all kinds, from memoir and personal essay to op-ed and how-to articles. We will dive into what makes a story—from structural archetypes to writing that flows—and learn how to harness the power of story to make nonfiction compelling and transformative.
Wild Ideas: Nature, Science & Creativity (Fall 2026)
Created in honor of Helen Ghiradella’s pioneering work at the intersection of science and creativity, this Journey invites mentees and mentors to explore the natural world through the complementary lenses of scientific inquiry and artistic expression. Inspired by Ghiradella’s legacy, and through close observation, research, and reflection, they will investigate the forms, patterns, and processes found in nature while creating an original project—through writing, visual art, media, performance, music or another creative form—that celebrates the connections between nature, science, and creativity.
The Career Journey: Inside Book Publishing (Fall 2026)
Discover the various roles in publishing that bring books to life, from editorial and design to marketing, publicity, production, and more. Through conversations with publishing house and literary agency professionals, participants will gain insight into the nuts and bolts of a book's journey from concept to publication.
