Why Study PPA?

Publishing and Printing Arts is a minor program that explores the ethical, cultural, and commercial issues confronting readers, writers, editors, publishers, booksellers, librarians, teachers, and all who value the written word. But PPA also offers students solid pre-professional skills, and each year our active internship program helps launch students into publishing-related careers across the country including jobs at Amazon and in New York publishing houses.

Why Study PPA at PLU?

For more than 30 years Pacific Lutheran University’s Department of English has offered a way to help students translate a love of books into an exciting professional career in publishing. The distinctive interdisciplinary curriculum in Publishing and Printing Arts (PPA) is highly respected by employers because it combines pre-professional skills and experience with the solid foundation of a liberal arts education. This six-course minor is designed to give students with talents and interests in writing, graphic design, communications, or business a head start into the world of publishing and a broad variety of related professions.

Careers for Publishing and Printing Arts Minors

The PPA program readily complements majors concerned with language and the written word, such as English, languages, public relations, journalism, marketing, and graphic design. But students majoring in a wide spectrum of disciplines—from biology to music to anthropology—have discovered the value of a PPA minor, too. It helps to connect them to publishing career opportunities in those fields and provides a richer understanding of the complex roles that written communications of all sorts play in our lives and in our modern world.

Additional Opportunities for Publishing and Printing Arts Minors

Internships

One special feature of the PPA program is the variety of internships it supports, both full-time and part-time. Recent sponsors include Yale University Press, Parenting Press, Minnesota Historical Society Press, Fulcrum Publishing, Marquand Books, and NavPress, as well as several libraries and museums. New opportunities are always emerging with presses, in the growing fields of technical communications, and in the publication departments of companies.

PPA minors are also leaders in PLU’s student publications, including the Mast and Saxifrage.