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iceveela
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21 Apr 2012, 6:27 pm

I research a lot, write a lot, and own a few blogs, so I thought that being a writer would be good. But it is very hard to make any form of income as a writer, and I only like to write about my special interests. So having a career as a freelance writer would be too difficult to do. What should I do with a bunch of information on health and well, and animals? I don;t want to be a vet or a doctor or anything. I want to be a researcher, but that will mainly be freelance as well, so...

I wanna be freelance, but is there any way I can make sure i get a good enough income on freelance without all the confusing marketing things?


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cathylynn
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21 Apr 2012, 6:44 pm

researchers, and by that i mean people who think up and perform experiments, generally work for a university, a company, or the government.

if your special interest is medical stuff and animals, i would think there would be a market for your writings.



rachel_519
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21 Apr 2012, 9:47 pm

iceveela wrote:
I research a lot, write a lot, and own a few blogs, so I thought that being a writer would be good.

You sound like me. I almost majored in English in college because I though I should be a "writer." Problem was, I had no idea what I wanted to write about, I just wanted to write. :D So, I ended up changing my major. It turns out good writing skills are an asset many different career fields.

Back to your original question, look for a field where you can use your writing skills, preferably writing about something that interests you. I agree with cathylynn, research is a good field. Are you in college? If you are still preparing to go to college, try to find a school where you will have research opportunities as an undergraduate, so you can start getting experience early on.


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Stargazer43
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21 Apr 2012, 11:17 pm

If you want to actually conduct your own research, you'll typically need to get your Ph.D and work either for a university or the government as has been mentioned. There are options for research with a masters or even a bachelors, but they are much more limited. There are plenty of research assistant jobs though if that's something you'd be interested in. Those are mostly at universities, I think the spots are usually filled by students so I'm not sure if you can get one of those kinds of jobs without being a student.

Now if you really do want to go into research, then I'd find a topic that really interests you and see what you'd need to do in order to participate in research in that field. You said you don't want to be a doctor, so I believe that really cuts down on opportunities for medical research (I think most medical researchers have their M.D./Ph.D). If you want to do animal research, probably biology or animal science fields would be good to look in to. Like I said above though, without a Ph.D. it will be really hard to get into research, especially if you're planning to do it freelance or on your own.

You should also look into journalism, since it sounds like that may be more where your interest lies. They do a lot of writing obviously, but they also do a great deal of research for their stories (albeit an entirely different and completely unrelated kind of research to the kind described above). There are also many journalists who do focus on specific areas such as healthcare or animal well-fare. I'm not sure how the job prospects look in the field but it may be worth taking a look at.

Also just an aside, but I'm not super-familiar with any of these fields so don't take my word as fact...do some 'research' on your own also!