Always Writing: Blogging and the Pandemic Diary

Tracy Sherlock began teaching in KPU’s Department of Journalism and Communications Studies in 2017. Prior to joining the Faculty of Arts, Tracy worked as a reporter and editor at the Vancouver Sun, where she served as education beat reporter and books editor. Having also written for the New York Times, the Vancouver Courier, and National Observer, Tracy has received the Jack Webster Award (B.C.’s top journalism prize) and a citation of merit for the Michener Award (a national award that recognizes public service journalism).

Recently, Tracy shared with us her love for reading, writing, and blogging.  Tracy is a dedicated weekly blogger with three distinct sites: Education Matters, Cover to Cover, and Pandemic Diary.  When the lockdown began last March, Tracy immediately began keeping a weekly account of Covid. She anticipates that her Pandemic Diary blog will continue long into the future as we move through the vaccination rollout and learn to manage the virus.

Could you reflect briefly on the blog form in general – its benefits and challenges?  How do you see this online form of writing intersecting with your longstanding interest in public service journalism? 

The great thing about blogs is also the terrible thing about blogs – they allow anyone to be a publisher. While that is fantastic for people like me who love writing and have a desire to communicate with the public, it has been dreadful for traditional media because their monopoly on publishing is now over. That’s a good thing, but it has left traditional media without its traditional business model, which relied on print advertising. On a personal level, it’s an unusual experience because you often have no idea if anyone is reading. Sometimes, a story will resonate with a wider audience and other times it won’t. Having just written that though, I will say that is similar to publishing in traditional media – I never knew which stories were going to get a lot of attention and which ones would not.  

Presently, you have three blogs: Education Matters, Cover to Cover: Read All About It , and your Pandemic Diary.  What fueled your desire to start each of these blogs and what has the response been like from your readers? 

I started Pandemic Diary last March, when the pandemic was declared. I was avidly following all of the news and wanted to track it somehow. Over the summer, I did a lot of reflective pieces, but since the fall I’ve been sticking with just one a week. It has been nearly a year now, so I’ve got a full record of what we’ve been thinking about throughout the crisis. I plan to continue Pandemic Diary until COVID-19 is “over,” if that day ever comes!  

I was the education reporter at the Vancouver Sun for several years and after I left the Sun, I wrote an education column for the Vancouver Courier for a few years. When the pandemic hit, the Courier was shut down, but I didn’t want to give up on writing about education, so I started Education Matters. The goal with Education Matters is to write education stories with kids’ best interests in mind. I would love to grow it into a money-making enterprise but haven’t been able to dedicate enough time to it so far.  

I was also the books editor at the Vancouver Sun, so I’ve been reviewing books for the past 15 years or so. Again, I didn’t want to stop when I left the paper, so I carried on by creating Cover to Cover. Whenever I read a great book, I post up a review to share my recommendation with others. Each review is a quick read, designed to be exactly how I would recommend a book to my friends.  

As far as the response from readers, as I mentioned earlier, sometimes I get a strong response and other times I hear nothing. Sometimes I will run into someone I haven’t seen for a while and they’ll say, “Oh, I loved that book you recommended,” and I will have to think about how they would have known about that. When they tell me they read it on my blog, I’m always a bit surprised to have readers!  

You began writing your Pandemic Diary on March 20, 2020 with reflections on the situation in Italy.  Since then, you’ve written a post every single week and are now on Week 51. Sometimes your posts have incorporated your own experiences — such as waiting for a Covid test in a Richmond parking lot, or hearing the sounds of children playing outside after experiencing long intervals of silence during the ‘lockdown.’  When you reflect back on your Pandemic Diary, is there anything that surprises you about what you witnessed or experienced?  As someone living through Covid and also reporting on it, has your perspective on the pandemic shifted over time? 

The biggest surprise for me is that we are still dealing with Covid. I think when I started Pandemic Diary, I thought it might be a project for a few months. Now I’m not convinced I will ever stop writing Pandemic Diary! That’s big shift. I think we’ve all, collectively, been through a significant trauma with this pandemic and I don’t think the world will ever be the same.  

Your postings on Education Matters focus on the K-12 public school system and often highlight how B.C. has been coping with the pandemic.  As a faculty member teaching online in a post-secondary institution, do you see any important lessons from the K-12 experience that may be important to consider when universities begin offering more in-person courses to students? 

This is a great question! There is so much to consider when thinking of post-secondary institutions going back to in-person instruction. One of the things the K-12 system has done, and that I think has been quite effective – is the use of cohorts. They’ve limited the number of people who interact with each other on a daily basis, which will be difficult for post-secondary programs that are not cohort-based. In a traditional university schedule, students mix and match with hundreds of other students every day, both in class and in public spaces. The K-12 system has also provided online options for students, which is probably something post-secondaries will have to consider for students who are immune compromised or who live with someone at high risk. By having an online option, it has made the in-class population smaller, which has allowed for some physical distancing in some cases.  

Many school districts got very creative with their scheduling, such as offering a new quartermester system, in which students only take two classes at a time. This was done to decrease the number of personal interactions each day and week. Post-secondaries may have to consider something like this if they want to move back to fully online classes before the pandemic is over.  

There is a self-screening system in K-12 and anyone with symptoms is encouraged to stay home. If a teacher has to stay home, that is generally okay in public schools, because there are support teachers who can cover if a substitute teacher cannot be found. (This is not an ideal situation, because the students who need extra support lose out, but at least there is someone to teach the class.) Some smaller schools have had to shut down when there are not enough staff members to cover classes. It’s much more complicated to cover short-term absences in the post-secondary system, so some adaptation will likely need to be made there.  

K-12 schools have stayed open because in-class learning is critical for young children’s social and emotional well-being, as well as their parents’ ability to go to work. For post-secondary institutions, the priorities are different, but in many cases, in-person learning is just as important. It will be a matter of figuring out the priorities and getting creative to find a way to make those work.  

With three blogs on the go, you must be extremely dedicated since the form demands the regular publishing of new content. Would you share with us what your writing process looks like? Do you have a certain rhythm that works well for you?  

I’m always writing! My process involves starting with thinking and reading. I read everything, everywhere. I’m always reading novels, memoirs and other narrative non-fiction. Usually, I have two or three books on the go and another ten or so in a big pile on my bedside table. I read three newspapers every day. So, the reading and the thinking come first. Often, an idea for a piece will come to me from something I’ve read and then thought about further. Next comes more research. What have others written about this topic? What’s important context for me to know? Then, usually comes interviews with experts or people who have been affected. Once I have most of the pieces, I just sit down and write. I’m not a great outliner, although sometimes I have to do that to organize myself. I don’t love transcribing interviews so I try hard to get a few quotes written down during the interview. After I write the first draft, I usually do a lot of re-writing if time permits. With a blog, I don’t have an editor, so that’s a challenge. Everyone needs an editor!  

To students who are considering majoring in Journalism or taking Journalism courses as electives, I would definitely say, “Go for it!” . . . You get to learn new things every day, meet interesting people, go behind closed doors, investigate wrongdoings, and change the world.

Tracy Sherlock, Department of Journalism and Communications Studies

You have long connections to KPU having completed your Journalism degree here.  What does KPU mean to you and what would you say to students who are considering majoring in Journalism or taking Journalism courses as electives? 

To students who are considering majoring in Journalism or taking Journalism courses as electives, I would definitely say, “Go for it!” While journalism jobs can be tough to get, if you are lucky enough to get one, it is the best possible career, except, of course, teaching in a university! You get to learn new things every day, meet interesting people, go behind closed doors, investigate wrongdoings, and change the world. On the practical side, I would say that today, every company in the world needs someone with a journalist’s skills. Journalists are excellent communicators, they know how to write with purpose and clarity, they can edit, they can make videos or podcasts and they’re not afraid to talk to people. These are extremely valuable and transferable skills in today’s job market and I’m willing to bet they will still be relevant in the future.  

As far as my own experience, I had a long road to a full-time journalism career and KPU was one important piece of that. I’m thankful that KPU was very flexible and set me up with good opportunities for my career. I had completed a Journalism Diploma at Langara College basically straight out of high school but graduated into a recession when jobs were scarce. I wanted to be a foreign correspondent, but I knew a diploma wasn’t going to be enough to get me the job I wanted, so I went to UBC to complete a degree in International Relations. Long story short, 15 years and many freelance gigs later, I still wasn’t working as a full-time journalist. KPU started its degree in Journalism and I saw an advertisement for it in the Richmond News. The ad said the degree included a practicum at a media company and I hoped if I got a practicum it would lead to a full-time job. I called KPU and they said that with my pre-requisites I could get the degree by taking one full year’s worth of courses, so I did it. I completed the practicum, which did score me a full-time job. After many years in Journalism, I completed a master’s degree in Global Change, with the intention of teaching in post-secondary. I didn’t suspect at the time that I would be teaching Journalism – I thought I would be teaching International Relations – but here I am and I’m very happy to be here. So I have a lot to thank KPU for!