Teaching Writing

(To mark twin 50^th anniversaries in 2017, as a fulltime running journalist and as a marathoner, I am posting a piece for each of those years. This one comes from 1986.)

A SMALL nudge can become a big direction-changer. My latest one began with an inch-long ad in the Sunday newspaper’s classifieds:

“University of Oregon School of Journalism seeks part-time instructors in advertising, public relations, radio-TV and magazine writing. Professional experience in subject area required. Submit resume’ to Ken Metzler, associate dean, at…”

My academic credentials were slim – a college minor in journalism, no advanced degree in any field – and I’d never taught a class. But I had attended the University of Experience for two decades and now needed another job. Income from the usual sources was shrinking.

I’d survived a scare at Runner’s World a year earlier, when Bob Anderson’s sale of his magazine Rodale Press left most of the staff jobless. I’d made that cut but was kept on now for reasons more historic than journalistic. I wrote little for RW, and heavy editing rendered much of the original copy unrecognizable.

My latest book, the Running Handbook, was the fifth financial flop in a row. I was running out of publishers willing to take on a new project with me. Races still wanted to pay me to come and speak, but I already spent too much time away from the two kids now living with me.

Teaching at the university might be a way to boost my income locally. I applied, and Ken Metzler called to arrange a job interview (my first in 20 years).

Metzler, the associate dean, said, “You look well qualified to teach magazine writing. But before giving you an answer, I’d like to see you in action at one of our classes. Can you give a guest lecture next week?”

Not only did I pass inspection there. I also talked briefly with a student who would become the new love of my life, though I wouldn’t recognize Barbara Shaw as such for another year.

From the start in this class, I played to my strengths (experience as an writer-editor) instead of working on my weakness (inexperience as a teacher). I treated the classroom as a magazine office, acting as an editor who assigned and critiqued the work of student-writers.

We went light on the lectures, heavy on the writing and revising. This would be learning by doing. I couldn’t teach talent, but could show how to train for writing and how to master the rules of this game.

Teaching journalism would lead eventually to something even better: teaching running classes, which then would lead to coaching marathoners. The approach would be the same as with the writers: learning by doing rather than listening, training to get the most from talent, mastering the tricks of the running trade.

Photo: Ken Metzler introduced me to college teaching, and to my future wife.

[Many books of mine, old and recent, are now available in two different formats: in print and as ebooks from Amazon.com. The titles: Going Far, Home Runs, Joe’s Team, Learning to Walk, Long Run Solution, Long Slow Distance, Miles to Go, Pacesetters, Run Right Now, Run Right Now Training Log, See How We Run, and Starting Lines, plus Rich Englehart’s book about me, Slow Joe.]