Chloe Ko is a graduating fourth-year Biology and Psychology major. She has been working for the Review as an Arts & Culture editor since fall 2023. Throughout her time, she has covered important stories related to Oberlin’s artistic and cultural spaces. She has developed a team of dedicated writers, prioritizing curiosity and a capacity for continuous growth. 

The following interview has been edited for length and clarity.

What have been the biggest challenges that you faced, and what are some of the biggest successes you’ve gotten to experience?

The most challenging aspect when I first started was the intimidation that came with knowing how important this newspaper is — being one of the oldest college publications in the U.S. A lot of imposter syndrome took over when I first started. Getting to know my coworkers and receiving their support was really helpful. They showed me this is an environment that encourages learning, growth, and community. That made the job much more approachable. Another part of the learning curve was figuring out how to best portray the most important Arts & Culture stories to the College and the wider community. A lot of what I did in the beginning was seek out reviews of things that were going on. But as I became more immersed in the artistic and cultural scene here, a lot of pitches came to me by word of mouth and just paying attention to what was occurring around me. Thankfully, over the years, we’ve had people who were excited about their own projects or about newsworthy events that were going on. Them reaching out to us has made our jobs a lot easier. 

One of the biggest successes that I am most proud of is being able to help Arts & Culture staff writers develop their craft. By implementing a monthly workshop where we meet for an hour with our entire team, I’ve really gotten to know their personalities, their strengths, their weaknesses, and encourage them to reflect on their growth. Many of our staff writers came in with little to no experience with journalistic writing. Working with them and seeing how much they’ve improved has been the most rewarding part of my journey. 

I’m also happy with the growth I’ve experienced with my own writing, considering I had no experience with journalistic writing before the Review. It’s been rewarding to notice how intuitive this writing and editing process has become. Now, I can focus on bigger stories and be excited about uncovering these stories rather than worrying about some of the intricacies of the job that I struggled with earlier when I was less experienced.

What about the Arts & Culture section do you hope changes after you graduate? What do you hope stays the same? 

I would like to see more engagement with our audience, potentially through social media. I know a lot of organizations are engaging with their community through social media, so that could be something to take inspiration from. I also would love to see more coverage of the City of Oberlin. I know oftentimes, those stories are harder to find out about because that word of mouth is not necessarily traveling to the students or to the Arts & Culture editors. But I think increasing outreach of the Arts & Culture section would be great in order to better serve the voices in our community. 

I hope something that sticks is the smaller community of the Arts & Culture team. I hope that beyond feeling like coworkers, they can always feel supported by each other, be excited together, and be able to grow with each other.

What advice would you give to someone who wants to write for Arts & Culture?

 I would say the most important trait to have is curiosity. I think specifically for Arts & Culture, one thing I love is the fact that art is inherently something that is so vulnerable and personal. Having the necessary curiosity to uncover those aspects and share it with readers is something I find really beautiful. 

Do you think anything you’ve taken from your time with the Review will stay with you when you leave Oberlin?

Similar to what I think is a strength in every writer, I hope that I can take the curiosity I’ve developed through this job and carry it with me into the future. I’ve been able to talk to so many amazing and interesting people with very complex personal histories and backgrounds. I’ve realized how willing many people are to share their stories if they are prompted with the right questions. That makes me excited to get to know the communities I’ll be working with as I go into psychiatry. Something that is very important to me is being able to know my community, and know the people I’ll be working with on a personal level. That means having a lot of curiosity, compassion, and empathy. 

Interviewing people throughout my journalism career has taught me the value of listening and being present for someone, and letting them talk about whatever they need to say. That is going to be increasingly important as I go into the field of mental health, and work with people who just need someone to hear their stories 

What’s been your favorite story to have on the section?

My favorite piece is something I’ve written called “Paper Making Art Therapy Heals Trauma, Brings Communities Together” (The Oberlin Review, Oct. 4, 2024.) When I saw this event, I initially thought that it would be a fun experience to make my own paper out of fabric. And it was. I was able to make my own paper and write letters to my friends, and I turned it into something that was sentimental and very dear to my heart. 

However, when I talked to Drew Matott, who was the host of that event and guided us through the paper making process. I was able to find out a lot about his motivations behind this project, which is called The Peace Paper Project. It related to his personal life, with his struggles with family. He wanted to find a way to transform clothing that might have traumatic memories attached to them into paper where you can creatively express yourself, redefining that object. He now travels at Veterans Affairs hospitals and allows veterans to turn their uniforms into paper. And I thought that transformation of a traumatic object to a creative vessel was so inspiring. I think whenever I find these very personal stories in pitches that I didn’t expect, it is so rewarding, and memorable. I still think about this article every once in a while, and it was two years ago. 

What do you want your legacy at the Review to be?

I want my legacy as an Arts & Culture editor to be someone who has been curious and encouraging. I just want to emphasize what I hope stays, which is the supportive community within the Arts & Culture team. I want future writers to know that they can be defined by their curiosity and their drive rather than where they begin regarding their experience or their accomplishments. I want to leave a legacy of continuous growth.