October/November 2003

Volume 44, Number 2

Student view: Summertime tech writing

by Tiffany Deking

My summer job was not your typical technical writer's position, but it certainly fit my experience and interests. I worked at The People-Pet Partnership at Washington State University in Pullman, Washington.

The program, which falls within the College of Veterinary Medicine, is researching ways to make the practice of small animal euthanasia easier for pet owners and medical facility workers. I was selected for the job based on my writing and research experience, as well as my interest in the human-animal bond. This position was a great way to combine what I was skilled in with what I liked to do, and it offered me a chance to be published as a coauthor on a major academic paper.

My job wasn't all hard work in the library. I was in charge of feeding the program's four therapy horses while my boss was on vacation. I was also asked to fill in as a lead walker for a horse camp sponsored by the college, which was a lot of fun. But most of my summer was spent designing and distributing a survey, analyzing results, and writing the bulk of an academic article. Since I was the only person working on this research project for much of the time, I learned about every part of the process from start to finish. I now know exactly what is involved in such an undertaking, and will definitely use the skills I've learned as I write my thesis. I am very excited to see our article in its final form; we've submitted it to a major veterinary medicine journal, and hope to see it published soon. Technical writing, I've discovered, doesn't inevitably involve computer manuals—except, of course, when I'm trying to figure out how to run the software.

Tiffany Deking is a master's student in the department of Journalism and Technical Communication at Colorado State University.

Learn more about the People-Pet Partnership at www.vetmed.wsu.edu/depts-pppp.