Readers!
On September 6, I woke up and did what I should not do, which was immediately check my phone. I was startled by what I saw: A story I had written for Stanford Engineering went viral.
Or: at least stories based on the news piece I wrote for Stanford Engineering was making big waves. That’s normal, of course. When I write something for a college or university, even if it’s a feature story and not a press release, they usually use it to garner media interest so other journalists will write about it. I’m using writing about very specific science findings that are fascinating but only to a small group of people. This time, well, if you say that the food dye used in Doritos can make mouse skin transparent, people are going to pay attention.
This is the third time I’ve written for Stanford Engineering. It was a bit of a trek to get there, but I’m sharing this one because it shows how just checking in with editors regularly can keep you top of mind to write some really cool stuff. Here’s how it happened.
The Story: “Using a common food dye, researchers made mouse skin transparent” for Stanford Engineering, September 5, 2024
The Back Story: My first full time job out of college was in the public relations department of an Ivy League Medical. That experience gave me an inside view of how many writers colleges and universities typically hire (cough cough I write about it in my ebook). I used my prior experience to continue writing for medical and nursing schools. I also applied my knowledge of being from a construction family and working in construction — in high school and college but still! — into writing for engineering schools, which is why I sent Stanford Engineering a Letter of Introduction (LOI). That’s a cold call of an email. When I’m in big marketing sprints, I send up to five of these a day. Here’s what I sent back in 2021:
**
My name is Jen A. Miller, and I wanted to say hello in case you’re looking for writers for Stanford Engineering.
I’ve been a full time freelancer for 15 years, and in addition to my journalism work (I write the running column for the New York Times), I also write for [list of relevant clients], doing everything from press release to website copy to magazine cover stories. Below are a few samples of that work:
[links to six clips]
You can also find more at jenamiller.com.
Thanks for taking a look, and I hope to work with you soon!
**
Short, sweet and to the point. It worked, but it took a bit of following up, first three months after I sent the pitch. Then I had an informational video call with the editor eight months after that, and FINALLY after following up again, my first assignment a year and a half after I sent my first LOI. This is why it’s critical to send out a lot of these kinds of volleys. My hit rate is not bad, but it takes some work.
I enjoyed writing for that editor, but then he left and gave someone else my name. Completely fine. I have kept in touch with this person, who assigned to me again last fall. In July, I reached out to a bunch of editors I liked with an email, subject line “Checking in,” doing just that.
**
“Hey [Editor]! Hope you’re doing well. Just wanted to check in to see if you had anything you needed to assign out – I’m taking my vacation in late September, so I’ll be around.”
**
It worked. This newer Stanford editor passed my name onto someone else at Stanford Engineering who needed a writer for a big paper. That ended up being this story.
I had nothing to do with the story going viral. When I work for a college or university, I write the piece and then their public relations people take over from there. I did not use Doritos in my version because my editor made the call not to put in a brand, but of course journalists who wrote the story did. I don’t blame them. If I was on their side for this one, I would have too!
The Timeline
Initial letter of introduction: February 12, 2021
First follow up: May 14, 2021
Intro call: January 11, 2022
Second follow up: July 25, 2022
First Stanford Engineering assignment: August 15, 2022
Second Stanford Engineering assignment: October 17, 2023
Check in with editor: July 16, 2024
Assigned: July 26, 2024
Submitted: August 13, 2024
Publication Date: September 5, 2024
Paid: September 12, 2024
Before I get into the rest of it, reminder! I’m speaking at another webinar for ASBPE on Thursday. Details here!
Recent Bylines
“Using a common food dye, researchers made mouse skin transparent,” Stanford Engineering
“Maximize your community bank’s digital experience,” for Independent Banker
“National Hispanic Heritage Month: Why now ‘more than ever’ companies should celebrate,” HR Dive
“The need for speed can lead to problems on projects, engineers say,” Construction Dive
What I’m Reading
- Siena Summer by Teresa Crane. Before the end of World War I, a painter stumbles upon a child playing in the countryside in England. This chance meeting is the catalyst for a decades-spanning drama that takes the action to — you guessed it — Siena, Italy. I can’t say the novel was very good, but it was very twisty and melodramatic. I stuck with it just to see what happened next, even if the plot was a bit much.
- Siena: The Life and Afterlife of a Medieval City by Jane Stevenson. Speaking of Siena, I picked this up in Florence earlier this year, and read it finally because you might take a wild guess at where I’m going next. I’ve been to Siena before, but it was with a boy, and, uh, I wasn’t all that interested in seeing churches. Not so this time! This is a history book, so it’s not exactly the most exciting thing to read, but I learned a lot that I hope will be helpful shortly!
- The City of Falling Angels by John Berendt, read by Holter Graham. Another non-fiction book, this one about the 1996 fire at La Finice, an opera house in Venice, Italy. I learned about the fire, and how it changed how the fire department works in Venice (no cars, only boats!) on that same last winter trip, and wanted to know more. I did through this book, but Berendt used it as a way to launch into a broader book about Venice, which didn’t quite work. The tangents were too long and wandering. That’s what walking in Venice is like, but that approach wasn’t effective here.
- The Quiet Damage: QAnon and the Destruction of the American Family by Jesselyn Cook. I can’t recommend this book enough, especially if you’ve lost family/friends to conspiracy theories, or just hate that a mass psychosis seems to have overtaken a large chunk of the country. Cook focuses on the stories of normal people who, for one reason or another, fell into the conspiracy trap, and how it devastated their families. She also shows that the people pulled away by this aren’t idiots or morons, but fall away due to an often complex set of issues, like an incorrect medical diagnosis, or isolation, or fear, and pulls them in so fast that it can be hard to get out. One of the people featured, for example, was a proud supporter of Bernie Sanders who went off the QAnon/Trump cliff. It’s just really well done. I stayed up way too late Monday night finishing it. I’ll also take this as an opportunity to plug the Knowledge Fight podcast once again, which uses Alex Jones as a central point to delve into the right wing misinformation ecosystem.
What I’m Watching
I’ve started a little project called “Movies I Missed” — movies I meant to see but didn’t because…life. I open up a streaming service and look around until I see a movie I meant to see, and press play. It’s lead to some interesting viewing!
- Butter. I watched this when, as happens every September, people re-learn about the wonder of the Minnesota State Fair, which I have been to twice. One thing you must see are the butter sculptures. This movie is set in Iowa, and the competition is different, but it’s less about butter and more about the hypocrisy of right wing Christians. The movie came out in 2011, but sure seems relevant today!
- Good Grief. Oh my heart. This movie, about the life of a widower (Dan Levy) after his husband’s death, is touching, sad and funny. I’m so glad I saw this. I’m still mad Himesh Patel didn’t win an Emmy for Station Eleven — but he’s also great here.
- Abused by Mom: The Ruby Franke Scandal. So it’s not all movies on this list. This one is a true crime documentary about a Mormon influencer and mommy vlogger who abused her kids. It provided more details than I’d heard before, but they also used AI to “recreate” Franke’s voice reading a letter. Why are we doing this? It’s gross.
- Missing: Dead or Alive? This is a docuseries about interlocking stories of people who investigate missing persons reports. It was OK — just OK.
- BlacKkKlansman. Based on the true story of a black man who infiltrated the KKK with the help of a white, Jewish colleague. It’s wild to me that John David Washington (son of Denzel) didn’t want to go into acting. He’s SO good. Also, casting Topher Grace as David Duke was a stroke of genius — then again, this is a Spike Lee joint. Very jarring to hear words coming out of Duke’s mouth that are on lawn signs for a Trump. But of course, that was done on purpose.
- Dumb Money. This is based on the true story about how a group of retail investors, connected by Reddit, shorted the stock of GameStop. This is the first movie I recall seeing that showed the pandemic. It’s just part of the story, and it’s refreshing to see someone showing the trauma we as a humanity went through. The movie also does a good job of showing the differences between rich and poor by who doesn’t wear masks (the rich) and not (the people serving them). Paul Danno is great in this. He’s made some interesting career choices. It’s silly to say “one to watch” when he’s had so much success, but truly, he is.
- The Wings of the Dove. This movie is full of DRAMMMMMA. But then again, it’s based on a Henry James novel of the same name, so of course it is. Man knew how to write soaps. I picked it because it’s mentioned in The City of Falling Angels, which filmed in Venice, and so I wanted to see what he was writing about. Also: I didn’t know Linus Roache was British. I’ve always associated him with Law & Order.
- Into the Fire: The Lost Daughter. I know I probably watch too much true crime, but I’ve recognized some patterns in that time. One is that if someone says things like “this is a small, close knit town, this kind of stuff doesn’t happen here” and/or “it’s a very religious community, everyone goes to church every Sunday” there’s evil hiding underneath, and most likely, the person committing the murder is a clergy person or a family member. SURPRISE I was right here. This story is so awful. It’s about Cathy Terkanian, who had given up a baby for adoption when she was a teenager. Thirty six years later, she finds out that child is missing, and has been for 21 years. She decides against all odds to find out what happened. She did this despite how she was treated, first by being pressured into putting her daughter up for adoption, then by people saying she threw her daughter away because she did what she was told was the right thing. And the people who say that? Trash. Just trash. I’m not going to spoil anything, but the whole thing is worse than even I imagined even though I guessed who did it at the start.
- The Laundromat. Where Dumb Money gracefully explained the finance behind shorting a stock, The Laundromat was not nearly as effective in showing how the scam behind the Panama Papers worked. Ah well. Not a completely waste of time, but not the best movie I’ve seen of this bunch.
- Bombshell. Another based on a true story. Sensing a theme? This one is about how Gretchen Carlson of Fox News took out Roger Ailes. It was a bit of a push and pull for me on this one. I think Megyn Kelly is a vile person (including a new incident just yesterday!!!) but what she went through sucked. The hair and makeup team absolutely earned their Best Oscar for Achievement in Hairstyling and Makeup. Charlize Theron looked so much like Kelly that I sometimes forgot who was playing the role.
Nail Polish of the Week
It’s a two-fer. First, I did try to run a 50K on Sunday, but I kicked a boulder, and dropped out mile 13. My foot is stiff but fine (good thing since I am leaving for Italy next week!!!!!!!). Anyway, about 10 miles in, I realized that my fingers were very swollen, signaling dehydration. It was very easy to see because I’d pained my nails Hold ‘Em Tight by Essie, which is part of the Game Theory collection I love. It’s a matte finish but add a layer of Zoya’s Ultra Glossy Seal Topcoat, and it has a nice shine. Second polish is To DIY For by Essie, a solid but not too red of an orange. It have it on my toes, and it survived being beat up against the tops of my trail running shoes, and me stepping into a stream. Solid choice!
I don’t know if I’ll send a newsletter before I go. As usually happens before I take a significant trip, I have a lot of work to tackle before I go (though I did pass my Intermediate Italian class just last week so that’s cleared off my plate). In case you don’t hear from me until October, ciao ciao!
Until next time,
Jen A. Miller
Notes from a Hired Pen ebook series
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