Staff Spotlight: Rebekah Harding

Photo by Haley Domzalski

By Maggie Mancini

Front-of-Book Editor Maggie Mancini spoke with Features Editor Rebekah Harding to talk about the impact of the COVID-19 outbreak, summer plans, and the Rejection Issue. Harding joined the REFINE team as a digital contributor last spring, and as a member of the editorial team for our Sustainability Issue last fall. She was previously an editorial intern at Philadelphia Magazine, where she’s now a contributor. 

Disclaimer: This interview has been condensed and edited for style and length.

MM: We were supposed to do this interview in person, but Temple has moved online and many students have moved to social distancing or quarantining. How has the outbreak impacted your semester? 

RH: Right off the bat, having to move off of campus. I live really close to campus, but not on campus. I still decided to go back to my hometown in the D.C. metro area, just to kind of wait this thing out with my family. Moving online has actually proposed a unique set of difficulties for me because I have attention deficit disorder. But just having learning disabilities makes it difficult for me to time manage and adjust to the online aspect of the social distancing and campus closure. I’m having a lot of feelings of impending doom and frustration. I’m trying to get through it and figure out how to do an online class. 

MM: You came up with the original idea for the Rejection Issue. What was your thought process, and why do you think it’s something important for REFINE to touch on this semester?

RH: I came up with the idea over the summer, before we had even done our Sustainability Issue, and was thinking about pitching it, but as a new editor, I kind of had this sense of imposter syndrome. I’d written for REFINE before, but didn’t want to just be that girl, and be over-enthusiastic when I was still learning the ropes. I found that rejection is something that we all can relate to no matter who you are, what your path in life is, and it covers all the bases. You can experience rejection in relationships, with school, with your career, and just like how the coronavirus is affecting students now. A lot of seniors are experiencing this overwhelming sense of rejection for not being able to have a commencement ceremony, not being able to graduate among their friends, not being able to experience their senior spring. When we picked the rejection topic, we didn’t even realize that the coronavirus would get to this point. So, I almost think it’s this weird coincidence and it’s appropriate that we picked this topic for REFINE this semester since all of us are experiencing rejection in a way we’ve never experienced before. 

MM: Do you have any personal or professional experiences with rejection you’d be willing to share? 

RH: When I studied abroad in South Korea last summer, I almost experienced a rejection of how I thought things were going to go––especially with making friends in a study abroad program and it not fitting this picture-perfect ideal that I’d played over and over in my head. I’ve been studying Korean since middle school, and I can speak at a working proficiency, but I went into it overconfident, thinking nothing would go wrong, and experienced rejection in a way that was humbling––not so much devastating. But when I was over there, I realized I make mistakes when speaking Korean, which is totally normal and part of the learning process. But I had to get comfortable with rejection because being part of a different culture and a different language really opened my eyes to the idea that rejection isn’t a bad thing and rejection is what defines your experiences positively and negatively. Rejection is neutral.

MM: While everything has been crazy surrounding the COVID-19 outbreak, what are your summer plans, at least for the time being? 

RH: I recently received a rejection from a summer internship I was really hoping for, possibly due to the program having to adjust to COVID-19 closures. Ultimately, we don’t know what’s going to happen so I’m taking it one day at a time. In the meantime, I’m really excited to start working with next year’s team of editors and writers as REFINE’s new Editor-in-Chief so that we’ll be ready to create great content no matter what shape the Fall 2020 semester takes. And if business opens up again, I might try to get a job as a barista—I’ve always wanted to know how to make fancy coffee. No matter what happens I’m going to do my best to enjoy the summer.