ParentLife Blog

ParentLife Writer Guidelines

Thank you for your interest in writing for ParentLife. We are interested in finding Christian writers who are able to deliver professional journalism. By following these guidelines, you enable us to get to know you, your writing style, and how carefully you can craft an article that will impact parents. At the same time you will have less frustration trying to figure out what our editorial team is really looking for when we evaluate manuscripts. To see a complete issue of ParentLife, visit http://www.lifeway.com/parentlife

Who We are

Our Vision
All articles submitted should be consistent with the vision of our publisher, LifeWay Christian Resources, as well as our magazine.

ParentLife vision: To encourage and equip parents with biblical solutions that will transform families.

LifeWay vision: As God works through us . . . We will help people and churches know Jesus Christ and seek His kingdom by providing biblical solutions that spiritually transform individuals and cultures.

Parentlife Audience
Our readers are primarily evangelical Christian parents of babies through 12-year-olds. Most of our readers are women, although we are making a concentrated effort to impact more fathers throughout our entire magazine. Our audience is a mixture of stay-at-home moms and dual-income families. We have a mixture of homeschool, Christian school, and public school families. We are also sensitive to the needs of single parents, working parents, expectant parents, adoptive families, grandparents, and families with special needs.

How to Establish a Writing Relationship

We are currently accepting fewer unsolicited manuscripts. At the same time, we know that God may have a message that we might overlook if we don’t at least glance at the submissions that do come into our office. For any questions about the process, please contact our Editor:

Jodi Skulley
ParentLife
One LifeWay Plaza
Nashville, TN 37234-0172
jodi.skulley@lifeway.com
(615) 251-2196

Writer Approval Process
ParentLife has been added to LifeWay Church Resource’s writer approval process PEOPLE. The PEOPLE system has allowed LifeWay Church Resources to have one approval process for all speakers, trainers, and writers, whether you would like to write for Sunday School, leadership, devotional, or parenting products. To be approved as a writer, you will need to apply on LifeWay’s Web site at www.lifeway.com/people. ParentLife can be found by choosing that you want to be a writer for “Childhood Ministry (preschool and school-age).” Some LifeWay products require that you be a member of an SBC church. ParentLife does not but requires for you to provide a statement of faith, writing sample, and references. We suggest you paste in pre-written statements so the program will not time you out. The PEOPLE system will automatically send you updates as the approval process progresses.

Clips, Published Pieces, Queries, and Manuscripts
After you are approved in PEOPLE, please send queries to the Editor listed above. We prefer that queries be submitted for evaluation rather than completed articles or manuscripts. We rarely accept a submitted manuscript as is without requesting changes. Articles are not returned without a SASE. Journalists will be evaluated on their ability to convey the tone and editorial voice of our magazine.

Bio Form and Resume
Some writers are asked to complete a bio form for ParentLife staff to keep on file in our office.  However, these bio forms were primarily used to approve writers before the PEOPLE database was established (thus the duplication of some questions). A current resume is not required, but it will help us identify your formal writing training, experience in feature writing, and recent publishing credits. We do accept Christian writers from various denominational backgrounds.

Contracts and Payment
Be patient. Due to the large number of queries and manuscripts received, we have been known to keep an article for 6 months or more before stepping out to invite a new writer to write for us. If you want an immediate yes or no as soon as we receive the article, the answer will be no in most cases. If we decide to accept your article, we will contact you to discuss payment and will ask you to sign a non-exclusive rights contract. To process your payment, you will need to verify your social security number and phone number on your contract. You will receive, without cost, one complimentary copy of the issue in which your article is printed. The complimentary copies are processed outside of our department, so if you do not receive your copy, you can contact our editorial team and we will be happy to send you a copy.

Extra Copies of Magazines
You can order extra copies of the magazines by writing LifeWay Customer Service Center, MSN 113, One LifeWay Plaza, Nashville, TN 37234-0113, emailing customerservice@lifeway.com or by calling 1(800) 458-2772. Please encourage your church or parenting groups to order our magazines.

Quick–Tips for Writing Submissions
Please use these tips as a reminder when sending in your manuscript. They are an overview of what we are looking for when your article arrives. We suggest that you use these tips as your guide to make sure that you are writing to our specifications with our mission and target audience in mind.

Cover page includes title of article; a short writer bio; total word count; writer’s full name, phone number, and email address.

The article is being submitted in one of the following ways:
1. If the article is being submitted in hard copy form through regular mail, the writer agrees to submit it electronically at the time of contract.
2. If the article is being submitted by e-mail, the attachment can be sent to jodi.skulley@lifeway.com.

Quoted Bible references must be from the HCSB and do not need to be photocopied. We already have permission to use the HCSB in our magazine.

Quoted material must be properly documented (source, publisher, date, and page numbers) along with permission verification and a photocopy of the original quote.

Statistics or factual information which the public would not normally know need to be properly documented along with a photocopy of the information.

Include two blurbs or pull quotes that will quickly draw the reader into your article.

Headings and subheadings are needed throughout the article and should relate to the suggested title.

Include at least one and possibly up to three sidebars that could impact the reader.  The sidebar provides helpful information that the reader will value. We request all articles be submitted with a list of further resources. In general, these make nice sidebar items: quick tips, ministries, suggestions, Web sites, books, phone numbers, addresses, and so on.