Hi all, I'm Allison MacLachlan, an NASW Graduate Travel Fellow this year. I am currently a Master's student in MIT's Graduate Program in Science Writing, and am very much looking forward to attending my first NASW meeting this coming weekend.
Originally from Toronto, I recently graduated from Queen's University in Kingston, Ontario, where I did my undergraduate degree in English and Life Sciences. Along the way, I worked as a contributor and an editor at the Queen's Journal, where I developed an interest in writing news and features. I also managed the science side of a student-run magazine called Syndicus, which publishes articles and essays on fun, quirky academic topics for a lay audience.
This year, I'm writing as a correspondent for MIT's Scope and am having a great time exploring lots of new and unfamiliar scientific territory. My recent articles on Scope cover topics like internet mapping, artificial skin and the link between urbanization and tuberculosis. Currently, I'm working on a feature story about synaesthesia and a thesis project that traces our culture's relationship with aspartame.
This weekend, I will be blogging about the "Profitable Freelancing" session. Having been advised many times that every writer will freelance at some point in his or her career, I think this workshop will provide some valuable insights into a field that remains somewhat mysterious to me. I am interested in the relationship between writing and business, and look forward to learning more about how ideas like productivity and efficiency relate to the writing process. See you in New Haven!
