Program Options
Current Office Hours (Group Mentorship)
Current Office Hours (Group Mentorship)
Current Office Hours (Group Mentorship)
During Office Hours, an editing mentor hosts an online office hour on Zoom or in Slack focused on a specific theme. Association members can ask questions, get feedback, learn about resources, and explore issues related to professional editing careers.
Mentors come from a range of editing specializations (fiction, academia, memoir, medicine, nonprofits, government, corporate communication, etc.), and each office hour is limited to a small number of editors to ensure everyone has time to get feedback.
Register for office hours as a mentee or a mentor
November 3, 2024. 1:00 – 2:00 pm US Eastern (convert to your time zone)
- Mentor: Shannon Scott
- Theme: Social Media Best Practices
- Description: We’ll discuss best practices for using and staying safe across social media platforms while still being active and engaged.
December 11, 2024. 7:00 – 8:00 pm US Eastern (convert to your time zone)
- Mentor: Sam Keir
- Theme: Editing Indie Fiction: Starting Out and Getting Your First Client
- Description: I still consider myself a newbie editor in many ways, but I’ve picked up a few things in the past three years, and I’d love to share some of my approach in the hope you can gain something from it, too. I’ve worked mostly with queer crime and MM romance fiction writers, but I hope there’s something useful to apply in all genres. Building relationships with indie authors, finding edibuddies, social media marketing, establishing clear working practices, and volunteering have all played a part (I believe) in securing a steady stream of fiction-editing work during the past year. It’s always a work in progress, so let’s keep on learning!
View examples of past Office Hours sessions below.
Want to volunteer as a mentor to lead an office hours session? Apply here.
Can’t make it live to an office hours session? Pop into the #Editor-Advice channel in our private Slack community whenever you want for asynchronous chat, answers to your questions, and advice.
Individual Mentorship
Current Office Hours (Group Mentorship)
Current Office Hours (Group Mentorship)
Our individual mentorship option pairs an experienced mentor with a mentee who is newer to the industry or to a specific editing area. Each individual mentorship cycle last for 1 month, and the mentor and mentee decide together their frequency and format of meetings, communication practices, and goals. The time commitment can be as little or as much as the pair decides.
Applications are due by 11:59 PM US Eastern (convert to your time zone) on the 1st of the month before each new cycle (e.g., April mentorship applications are due March 1). The first cycle will launch in February 2024, with applications due January 2, 2024.
Program Vision
Establishing mentorship options for LGBTQIA+ editors was the initial motivation behind our founder, Vee White, creating the LGBTQ+ Editors Association. They envision the program as a way for peers to support one another in their career goals, foster growth, and forge connections as well as one that recognizes mentors and mentees may come from a variety of lived experiences (accessibility needs, geographic regions and socio-cultural differences, and diverse backgrounds including but not limited to race, ethnicity, and different aspects of the LGBTQIA+ umbrella).
We ask our mentors to approach each session with humility, understanding their experience and approach are not always applicable to the lived experiences of others, and often mentees are best positioned to uncover the “answer” with support and encouragement from mentors. This can take the form of mentors asking questions, actively listening, and collaborating with mentees in discussion; providing connections; or suggesting resources.
To better ensure accessibility in the individual mentoring cycles, mentors and mentees can meet in various ways as suits their needs (video conferencing, text-based chatting in Slack, email, phone, etc.).
