What I've Learned: Sarah Neve

Sarah Neve, who is the current Managing Editor at UWeekly Austin, began her career at Austin Community College like most-- saving money and, more importantly, gaining experience.

UWeekly Austin is a locally owned news- print, tabloid-style magazine, specializing in emphasizing the voice of University of Texas at Austin (UT) students.

"Our home base is very close to UT, and we cover a lot of UT events, but [UWeekly Austin] has enough relevant content so that the ACC student should be able to relate to it," Neve said. "We actually extended our readership by placing bins at ACC campuses."

The magazine's focus is on interests that matter to its readers.

"We try to keep [the magazine] relative and localized to our readers," Neve said. There's a very heavy emphasis on live music, theatre and even bar culture, she said.

UWeekly Austin, which provides a very different service than a hard-news university paper like The Daily Texan, began as most local operations do--in a humble and very unconventional atmosphere.

"One of our clients offered us the shed in the back of his bar," Neve said.

But, like any Texas summer would have it, the temperatures were too extreme and consequently bridled the process.

UWeekly Austin is now being operated out of the powerhouse of a renovated garage, but they are looking to physically expand just as quickly as their readership.

Neve originally was offered the job at UWeekly Austin amid her studies at Austin Community College. Being faithful to the commitment she had made with ACC's student paper, the Accent, she did a dignified thing: she exchanged contact information with the man from whom the job offer came and made plans to revisit the prospect towards the end of the semester.

Six months later, she did just that. Neve was awarded the job at UWeekly Austin for which she was hand-picked.

Neve, who began her start in journalism at ACC in the spring of 2008 with the student magazine, Life4U, built upon her career with the unfailing aid of good networking. That Fall, she began to write for the Accent.

When asked about the cohesive process that ultimately scored her the position she has now, Neve laughed. "It's such a funny story," she said.

The sister of Neve's colleague was at a bar when she began to converse with another customer there. He'd explained to her that he was in town on business, building the foundation that would eventually enable UWeekly to branch off from it's out-of-state business center and locate to Austin, resulting in the unaffiliated, independent company that is UWeekly Austin.

Neve and her colleague's information was then passed on to the out-of-towner, and, not before long, Neve received the inquiring email that would eventually land her a position at UWeekly Austin.

"Transitionally, it was pretty basic," Neve said upon being asked about the transition period between ACC and her current position, a job that is not affiliated with a higher education center.

On being employed by a self-sustaining business, Neve said, "It puts you in a position where you have to do stuff that you didn't learn to do in college."

Neve attribute a lot of her experience to her time at the Accent where she served at Campus Editor, Assistant Editor, and Editor-in-Chief.

"I learned a lot while I was there," Neve said. "I had also been working together with the same staff for forever."

Neve was a natural-born journalist. Having gained experience in high school, and then graduating and gaining more experience working at Accent, the transition to UWeekly Austin may not have been very difficult, technically speaking.

"This is the first journalism job that I got independently from the people I had always worked with," Neve said. "It's shocking when you get out of college."

According to Neve, everyone must start somewhere, and building contacts and proactive experience within internships is an exceptional way to advance.