It is still in order to wish you a Happy New Year.
Hello. This is Anwuli Ojogwu, co-founder of SBMEN. On behalf of my board, staff and members, I want to say a big thank you to everyone on our newsletter list. Thank you for staying on the list.
This is our first newsletter and we are starting off with what call our “Annual Subscriber’s Letter”. This is our way of sharing our thoughts with you at the beginning of the year on where we think we are heading. From founding SBMEN in 2017 between two friends, then legally establishing it in 2018, and finally piloting programmes in 2019, we have come a long way. SBMEN, we have come to realise is more than just helping people become great editorial professionals; it’s also about building a community of peers. We have learned from one another and formed friendships. I and Enajite are grateful for the enthusiastic response to this initiative and we are working hard to improve.
This year, we are optimistic that we will deliver better training workshops. We learned a lot in 2019. Our experience reminded me of a book I read once called The Mouse Driver Chronicles by John Lusk and Kyle Harrison, two young men who established a business fresh out of Wharton School of Business and recorded their experiences. They called it an adventure as they stumbled, evolved and learned by practice how to build a company. That is the way we felt last year, building a non-profit association not for ourselves, but for other people. Every training was feedback: how participants were taught; where they were taught; the quality of the subjects; the time frame for course delivery; the practicality of the training, etc. And we learned many things — and still learning. As a young organisation, we understand the importance of editorial work on any media, and as experienced editors with combined experience of 23 years, we know the pride of producing satisfactory work; building a portfolio with a list of quality projects and reputable names. This makes us committed to continue to provide valuable trainings, because we want everyone to succeed, especially those transiting into the field.
This year, we hope that you will join us by attending our trainings and events and spreading the word about us. Here are a few highlights of what this year will bring:
Workshops: Workshops begin next month in February. There is going to be a lot of focus on keeping it practical. Our course themes remain the same: General Editing, Web and Print Editing, Fiction/Non-Fiction and Literary Criticism. However, we have tweaked the sub-topics a little bit for better output based on the responses we received.
Business Management Course for Freelancers: We have designed a stand-alone course on business management to address the needs of freelancers based on the feedback we received at last year’s Town Hall meeting. This will help freelancers learn more on the administrative and business aspects of editing and publishing.
Abuja Masterclass: We are launching our first workshop in Abuja this year due to many requests from potential participants who live in the Middle-Belt. It will be a Masterclass.
Special Guests: Part of our mission is to provide quality exchanges from professionals from Nigeria, Africa and the rest of the world. It’s part of our “knowledge exchange initiative”; therefore, this year, we are pleased to announce that we have invited two special facilitators to take workshops this year.
- In June, Ted Hodgkinson, the current 2020 Chair for the prestigious International Booker Prize, will be our special facilitator. He has been an editor at Granta and literally nearly every important literary publication in the UK. In 2018, for a second consecutive year, he was named in The Bookseller’s list of the 100 most influential people in publishing. Read more on him here.
- In September, Dzekashu Macviban will be our special facilitator. An accomplished editor and writer, he is also the publisher of Bakwa Magazine and Bakwa books based in Cameroon, that has produced several award-winning writers. You can read more on him here.
Ted Hodgkinson
Dzekashu Macviban
Members: We are introducing more customized services for members, who will have personalized pages on the new website as part of our Job Board initiative to create economic opportunity for them. More information will be shared soon.
Body of Work Project: This is for members too. It is part of our continuous professional development activity we call the Body of Work project. Editorial work requires constant practice to gain proficiency, which is what the project will provide for members. It will also provide them the opportunity of working on quality projects and with reputable names in publishing and media as a group, which they can add to their portfolio. The focus is always on developing publications in book or magazine form in any genre. This year, members of SBMEN will be producing an educational version of the Farafina Magazine, which stop publishing in 2012, and featured some of the finest writing from African writers, with the permission of Kachifo Limited.
We will be sending more information on these updates and more. It is a full year for us, and we are keeping our fingers crossed on this adventure. We will announce as soon as the training calendar is up on the website to download.
This is a long letter. Thank you for reading if you got this far. The year is still early, and we know you are pre-occupied with settling in.
But if you have questions, don’t fail to email us at: contact@sbmen.org.ng.
If you wish to become a member, you can also write us at: members@sbmen.org.ng or call 08120055823. Registration is open.
Thank you again, and I wish you a great year ahead.
Sincerely,
For SBMEN:
Anwuli Ojogwu
