While many of us were counting down the seconds to summer, the staff of the Great Books Symposium Journal (GBSJ) were hard at work putting together the spring edition of the Wright College Symposium Journal.
According to symposiumjournal.org, the GBSJ is a collection of student-written and peer-reviewed research papers on great books from the great books list. The journal is created, published, and maintained by the members of the Great Books Society student club at Wright College. Over the course of the spring semester, editors Allen Loomis, Amanda Jiang, and Edgar Esparza worked hard at compiling all the approved research papers into the final product with the oversight of Professor Michael Petersen as the advisor.
“The biggest challenge was getting used to the new design program and learning all the details. We were trying to match the style to the previous editions and successfully fit every paper together in a neat fashion. We wanted the edition to be our own unique creation,” said Jiang, now Editor-in-Chief of the Symposium Journal.
The spring publication, supposed to have been released during the spring 2017 semester, was delayed until June with a total of seven papers being published after passing the judging phase. The judging process for papers in the GBSJ is very rigorous and thorough. Papers are given to judges with no names to prevent bias while being read and can be accepted, rejected, or put on a wait-list where they will still be considered for publication after edits are made.
“As advisor I would give suggestions, but the editors made all the big decisions. They were so well coordinated that I just became a part of the group. The dedication and hard work of the staff certainly wowed me and the quality of all of the research papers were so impressive,” said Petersen.
The symposium journal wants to create a place where community college students can submit their research papers and, according to Petersen, the vision is to make Wright College the place for that to happen.
“I’m lucky to have worked with this team, and it was a gratifying experience holding the hard copy in my hand for the first time after printing. This was a big project that took many hours to complete. The team accomplished a lot: we organized and edited content, built a website, and printed the hard copy of the journal. Professor Petersen was there for us every step of the way to help guide and challenge us when we needed to make decisions for ourselves. The end result looks excellent, and the credit for its look and feel goes to Amanda Jiang and Edgar Esparza. They spent many hours on the format and getting the journal ready for the printing company,” said Loomis, former Editor-in-Chief of the Symposium Journal.
In order to have your work be eligible for publication your research paper needs to have MLA citation. Research papers can be submitted through symposiumjournal.com or sent to Professor Petersen at mpetersen@ccc.edu. Students can find previous editions of the symposium journal on symposiumjournal.org.
With the talent of the Wright College student body and the dedication of a fantastic staff the spring edition of the Great Books Symposium Journal was able to showcase the great works of research that Wright has to offer.