Publishing and Writing Alum Shares Her Story
Emerson’s Publishing and Writing MA is a versatile program that prepares students for a variety of careers. One of our alumni from this program, Tanya Pai, used her Publishing and Writing degree to pursue a career in journalism. Currently holding a director position at Yahoo News, Tanya met with us to discuss her experience at Emerson and how she got to where she is today.
What is your current professional role?
“My title is Director of Standards and Quality for Yahoo News,” Tanya says. She started at Yahoo in March 2024 and previously was the Director of Newsroom Standards and Ethics at Vox.
She adds, “I feel very lucky to have been able to find steady jobs in the industry for so many years. I think that has been a combination of luck, timing, and my experience.”
What brought you to graduate school?
“I graduated from college a semester early, so I moved back to my parents’ home in Texas and interned at a lifestyle magazine in Dallas,” Tanya explains. As she gained experience and interest in the magazine industry, Tanya began considering graduate school as a way to gain more professional skills.
With an undergraduate degree in public relations and English, Tanya wanted to continue using her creativity in graduate school. “I wasn’t sure I could make it as a full-time writer. I wanted something that balanced being able to find a job while also being creative,” she adds. Through her research, Tanya found that publishing might be a way for her to combine her creativity with practical job skills.
Why Emerson’s Publishing and Writing MA?
Tanya applied and got accepted to three different graduate programs, but what drew her to Emerson was the college’s emphasis on creative expression. “I liked that Emerson’s Publishing and Writing MA had more creative focus and allowed you to take literature and writing classes in addition to those practical skills of working in publishing.”
Tanya also recalls having promising conversations with the faculty and staff at Emerson. She says, “Based on my conversations and experience with people at Emerson and the resources they offered me, this program seemed like it would give me the best experience as a student.”
A final factor that helped Tanya choose Emerson was the school’s location. One of the programs Tanya considered was in New York, but she says that “Boston felt a bit more approachable and homey than New York.”
How did you balance work, school, and life while in graduate school?
“I think the program is set up really well because many of the classes are night classes.” Tanya adds that evening classes allowed students to attend graduate school without putting their lives on hold. “I had multiple classmates who had full-time jobs and families while in the program.”
Tanya herself held multiple part-time jobs and internships within the industry while in the program. She interned for both Dig Boston (formerly the Weekly Dig) and Boston Magazine. She cites these internships as one of the most important aspects of her graduate school experience. Tanya adds, “Internships help you learn how to be in a work environment, let you figure out if this is the career for you, and allow you to make connections in the industry.”
How was your experience living in Boston?
“I loved Boston so much,” Tanya says. “It was so cool having Emerson in the heart of downtown, and the city is so walkable. I also loved that there were so many students in Boston because there were always affordable things to do on a broke student budget.”
Tanya recalls the New England winters being a bit jarring, having lived in Texas and Florida previously. Overall, though, she greatly enjoyed her time in the city and continued working and living in Boston after graduating.
What has your career been like after graduate school?
Following graduation, Tanya’s internship at Boston Magazine led to a full-time Assistant Managing Editor position. She continued to work in Boston for a little over a year, building her experience in journalism and editing.
After Boston, Tanya moved to Washington, DC, where she worked at the Washingtonian Magazine. While working for the Washingtonian, Tanya learned about Vox, then a startup news outlet that was beginning to staff up.
“I originally interviewed for an Associate Editor position, but when I mentioned my experience with copyediting, they offered to create a position at the company to help ensure the quality of their journalism.” In 2015, Tanya joined Vox as Copy Chief and held several different positions with the company through nine years of company changes and growth.
At Yahoo, Tanya works with the whole news organization on standards and quality issues, across original journalism as well as partner content. “What I love about my job is the focus on quality and standards-setting — creating policies and processes that ensure we are giving users the best possible information and experience.”
What are you most passionate about within your career?
Tanya loves helping create journalism content that is factual, polished, and amplifies a diverse collection of voices. She says that practices such as fact-checking and sensitivity reading build trust and transparency with the audience. Especially during a time when trust in journalists is low, Tanya feels it is important for news outlets to focus on establishing their credibility and trustworthiness.
In alignment with these values, while at Vox, Tanya led a project called Language, Please. Tanya describes Language, Please as “a collection of free resources about how we use language, how language has evolved, and how language expresses identities.” Written in an open-ended, non-judgemental tone, Language, Please is a resource for those who want to consider how their content approaches social-, cultural-, and identity-based issues.
How did your time at Emerson help you get to where you are today?
“I took a copyediting course at Emerson with Karen English, which taught me so many fundamentals about grammar, style, and editing in general. I had helped edit friends’ papers, but I had never received formal training in editing before. Now I use those skills all the time.”
Tanya also built a strong network of friends and professional connections while in graduate school. She is still in contact with several friends from the Publishing and Writing program, and Tanya says she’s gotten some freelance work through those friendships. “That’s always a nice change of pace,” she adds.
Tanya also has kept in touch with professors from Emerson. Through these lasting connections, she has received several references and recommendation letters over the years.
What’s next for you?
Tanya is excited to be diving into her new role at Yahoo News and to continue focusing on newsroom standards and trust and transparency efforts, which are especially important as the election approaches.
Hopefully this article has given you more insight into the kinds of career paths possible with Emerson’s Publishing and Writing MA. If you have questions for Tanya about the journalism industry or her experience, feel free to reach out to her on LinkedIn. For more information about the Publishing and Writing program, schedule a call with an admissions counselor today.
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