Meet Your Managing Editor- Morin Mawhinney

Today marks the beginning of the 2016/2017 academic year! This year of endless possibilities for us at the Cadre, kicks off with an introduction of the ones who will keep you sated with news of happenings in and around our campus. Enjoy!

The phrase “fake it til you make it” has been around for years…but not for nearly as long as people have been doing it. It’s a controversial phrase; some people embracing it as their motto, others scoffing at its lack of discipline. When you consider the phrase in essence, though, what it really means is “I don’t know what I’m doing, so I’m just going to keep making it up until I do.” “Fake it til you make it” is really a synonym for another word that is much more respected in the English Language: learning. The definition of learning is, “the acquisition of skills through experience, study or being taught.” I’ve personally found that experience is the best teacher, and that is the real meaning of the “fake it til you make it” phenomenon. So to say that the upcoming year is going to be a “learning experience” would be a very classy way to state the reality. This is my first year out of high school, my first experience in the real world, and my first time as a managing editor. Although I have experience with newspapers and editing, this position is new and exciting, foreign and scary, all at the same chaotic time. However, this is the path I’ve chosen! I didn’t want to sneak in the back door of university, wiping my feet on the dusty welcome mat so I wouldn’t leave any footprints. This is me, boldly knocking on the gates of post secondary education with my weapon of choice: a notebook and pen. Although those won’t get me far in a zombie apocalypse, they should carry me through Anthropology 101.

By way of a more conventional introduction, I will give you the ABC’s of me. Even more, I will put in my best effort to make it not read like an eHarmony profile. Before being accepted as a managing editor at the Cadre, I was the Editor in Chief of my school yearbook, I performed as Nautica in Bluefield’s musical Bring it On!, and I did a co­-op term at the Guardian newspaper. Short stories, although at first presented a challenge, have become my favorite pieces to write. The vision of my future is blurred, like most people, however I foresee the involvement of Social Studies in my career, as well as plenty of travel. This year will be one of educational exploration, as I try out subjects unavailable at Bluefield. Words have always been an outlet for me. In my experience, any uncomfortable situation or upsetting event can be rectified with the right combination of colorful adjectives and nouns, even if those words are scribbled down in an passionate journal entry. I can’t say I have a favorite color (it feels unfair to the rest of the colors) but the best scent by far is that of laundry, fresh of the clothesline, the perfect mix of cotton and the wind.

Favorites and experience aside, I want to encourage any aspiring writers, journalists, or anyone with an opinion, to write something and send it into The Cadre. I’ll be one of your On-­Campus Managing Editors, so any UPEI issue or victory you feel is worth being written about should be one you write about and send in. Ernest Hemingway once said, “Write clear and hard about what hurts.” Do just that, and you will always be relevant. From me, this year, you can expect many a call to put pen to paper, so watch for that opportunity. My email ismmawhinney@upei.ca; feel free to use it. If you’re publishing shy, just remember that no one starts out as a Shakespeare or a Keats. You may surprise yourself, and better yet, you may surprise everyone around you; and when all else fails, fake it til you make it. I know I will.