Being an Editing Coach- Jake McMahon

Overall, I feel that this assignment was one of the most beneficial to me not only as an editor but as a writer as well. As I touched on in the assignment, all too often I focused on the negatives of the writing rather than touching on the positives and being more collaborative in the writing process. I feel that this not only discredited me as an editor but it may have been detrimental not only to the grade that my peers received on the assignment but on their overall writing confidence as well. I am glad that this assignment perfectly lined up with my roommate's final paper he had to write for his business class, as I was able to read this chapter and use the tips that I learned to assist him better than I have in the past. I have yet to hear about the grad that he received on this assignment, but I feel that he has a better chance of getting a great grade, as he was more confident in completing his assignment and he was able to use some of the tips that I provided to correct things himself rather than me nearly "rewriting" the entire thing like I have done in the past. Again, as I touched on in the assignment, not only will this be better for this individual assignment, it will also assist him in the future as well. I feel that it is very important to have a sense of humility when you are an editor, as acting like your word is fact and that they need to correct the things that you think are wrong can essentially create a "monster," as you are not always going to be right. I also feel that it is very important to ask questions and make sure that you are on the same page with the writer, as if not, you may not understand what they are actually trying to say and this could be detrimental, as you would correct it in the way that you believe it should be corrected and it may not match up or make sense with the points that they were actually trying to convey.