Editora da Unicamp is promoting the first moves to also become a school publishing house. The organization's educational segment, currently in the formatting phase, has offered a series of activities for undergraduate and postgraduate students at the University interested in acquiring specific knowledge linked to the editorial area. Starting next year, the objective is to offer the same opportunity to the external public, through the creation of extension courses. “Some of the large universities in Brazil and abroad have similar models, which have provided excellent results to the institutions”, says the director of Editora, professor Márcia Abreu.
According to the teacher, the proposal to also grant Editora the status of a school was included in the management plan of the current rector Marcelo Knobel. The central idea of the initiative is to transmit to other people the knowledge produced by the organization in book preparation activities, such as layout, text review, cover design and publication of works.
Dean Marcelo Knobel classifies the school publishing project as “fantastic”. According to him, the initiative effectively integrates Unicamp's publishing house with undergraduate, postgraduate and extension activities. “Interns participate in all activities related to publishing, learning in practice how a publishing house actually works. It is a very interesting and innovative project in the context of Brazilian university publishers”, he considers.
Listen to the testimony of rector Marcelo Knobel
To give impetus to the project, the Editora established partnerships with units and bodies of Unicamp itself, such as the Institute of Arts (IA), Institute of Language Studies (IEL), Institute of Philosophy of Human Sciences (IFCH), Laboratory of Advanced Studies in Journalism (Labjor) and Executive Secretariat for Communication (SEC). “We currently have 15 students interning with us, performing different functions. Most of them rely on scholarships granted by the Student Support Service (SAE). The experience has been very enriching, both for them and for us”, says the teacher.
According to the Editora director at Unicamp, the tasks carried out by students occur on two fronts. The first is related to preparing a book. The other front concerns the dissemination of publications. This has been done, for example, through the production of interviews with the authors, which are recorded in a podcast and later broadcast on Rádio Unicamp, in a program called “Orelha de Livro”.
Another initiative, called “Reading Drops”, consists of preparing a short text prepared by the students, which is recorded in audio and broadcast throughout Rádio Unicamp’s programming. The students are also involved in the production of the interview program “Café com Conversa”, which is shown on TV Unicamp. “Among the activities carried out by interns is participation in a weekly agenda meeting, in which texts, approaches and issues that will be addressed in the subsequent period are discussed. It is a relaxed meeting, but also very productive. In addition to being creative, the students show enormous enthusiasm for their work, which ends up rubbing off on us”, reports the Editora’s director.
According to Marcia Abreu, all students receive a certificate at the end of the internship, which has varying durations. “We have students who are both in their first and last year of graduation. As long as they maintain a link with the University, they can remain in the project. Depending on the period of the internship and the skills acquired, they can even apply for a position in the publishing market if they are interested”, understands the publisher's director.
All material produced by the students of the school publishing house is made available in a blog, created and maintained by students. “In addition to publicizing radio and TV programs, the blog features texts presenting launches and notable books from the publisher. To do this, we offer them support in preparing the texts. They read the books and write a publication note, talking about the work and the author, which we call 'Book of the Year'. A part of this textual production is also published by Jornal da Unicamp”, says Marcia Abreu.
classrooms
As part of preparing students to work in editorial activities, Unicamp has offered courses for this group. One of them, which dealt with aspects linked to publishing, was taught by Márcia Abreu herself, at IEL. The content is part of the curriculum of the Literary Studies course in that unit. Furthermore, Professor Noel Carvalho, from IA, has worked with interested parties to create videos and documentaries related to the publisher's books. One of the classes produced, as a course completion work, a video about the 2018 Entrance Exam Writing Book, which was shown during the last edition of Unicamp de Portas Abertas (UPA) and is available on Youtube.
Professor Daniela Birman, coordinator of the Literary Studies course at IEL, is also integrated into the project. She is offering the course “Topics in Text Production I”. During classes, students learn how to write literary reviews, interviews and reports. “I found the proposal to create the publishing house very interesting, and that's why I decided to establish a partnership with the publisher. One of the activities of the ongoing course will be the production of reviews and articles related to Unicamp's editorial activities, which will later be published on the blog and offered to Jornal da Unicamp”.
Currently, Daniela Birman works with two groups, with 20 members each. According to the teacher, students have demonstrated high involvement with the activities. “We don’t know if some of them will choose to work in the publishing market, but without a doubt the experience they are having will be valuable in each person’s professional future”, understands the teacher.
Learning
Mônica Guidi, a Literary Studies student, has just joined the project. She applied for the internship after taking the publishing course taught by professor Márcia Abreu. “It was really cool to get this spot. Here, I can work more on the production side, which is my interest, than on the research side, which my course is more focused on,” she says. Vinícius Russi, Mônica's coursemate, also considers the opportunity valuable. “With the learning we will have here, it is possible for us to seek a position at a publishing house at the end of our degree. Who knows, maybe at the Unicamp Publishing House itself, right?”, imagine.
Mariana Ferraz, another intern, is studying Social Sciences in her final year. She was participating in another project and, upon learning about the activities linked to the creation of the school publishing house, she decided to change. “The proposal caught my attention because of the experience itself. I have never had contact with this type of work. I really like reading and writing. Here, we can create, among other things, reviews and texts for dissemination on social media. I'm having the chance to improve my writing. I’m really enjoying this experience,” she declares.
