One workshop in a different genre
One workshop in any genre
In spring quarter of the second year, with advising and mentoring by the faculty, each student will complete the MA Capstone Essay.
In year three, students will be almost wholly dedicated to their creative thesis manuscripts. Third-year students will take three quarters of the MFA Thesis Workshop/Tutorial.
Some students will complete their MFA thesis manuscript by the end of this year; others will wish to take more time. The Graduate School permits students to submit the culminating project for the MFA at the end of full-time enrollment, or afterward.
In all three years, students will be mentored by the faculty in the practice of their writing, the design of their projects, and regarding artistic and intellectual resources for their work. In the teaching of creative writing and, through summer editorial work at TriQuarterly.org , students will get first-hand experience in editing a literary journal.
Visiting writers (including some anglophone international writers) will bring new perspectives to artistic practice, the three genres, and cross-genre or multi-genre work.
Students will pursue their work on our beautiful Evanston campus, amid artists, filmmakers, scholars and public intellectuals, with easy access to the vibrant literary arts scene of Chicago.
Each year, the MFA+MA program admits new students in two of our three genres. The genres in question rotate annually. Information on the application process and the genres in which applications will be considered can be found here .
The Creative Writing Program offers the MFA degree, with a concentration in either poetry or fiction. MFA students pursue intensive study with distinguished faculty committed to creative and intellectual achievement.
Each year the department enrolls only eight MFA students, four in each concentration. Our small size allows us to offer a generous financial support package that fully funds every student. We also offer a large and diverse graduate faculty with competence in a wide range of literary, theoretical and cultural fields. Every student chooses a special committee of two faculty members who work closely alongside the student to design a course of study within the broad framework established by the department.
Students participate in a graduate writing workshop each semester and take six additional one-semester courses for credit, at least four of them in English or American literature, comparative literature, literature in the modern or Classical languages or cultural studies (two per semester during the first year and one per semester during the second year). First-year students receive practical training as editorial assistants for Epoch, a periodical of prose and poetry published by the creative writing program. Second-year students participate as teaching assistants for the university-wide first-year writing program. The most significant requirement of the MFA degree is the completion of a book-length manuscript: a collection of poems or short stories, or a novel, to be closely edited and refined with the assistance of the student’s special committee.
MFA program specifics can be viewed here: MFA Timeline Procedural Guide
Every graduate student selects a special committee of faculty advisors who works intensively with the student in selecting courses and preparing and revising the thesis. The committee is comprised of two Cornell creative writing faculty members: a chair and one minor member. An additional member may be added to represent an interdisciplinary field. The university system of special committees allows students to design their own courses of study within a broad framework established by the department, and it encourages a close working relationship between professors and students, promoting freedom and flexibility in the pursuit of the graduate degree. The special committee for each student guides and supervises all academic work and assesses progress in a series of meetings with the students.
At Cornell, teaching is considered an integral part of training for a career in writing. The field requires a carefully supervised teaching experience of at least one year for every MFA candidate as part of the program requirements. The Department of English, in conjunction with the First-Year Writing Program, offers excellent training for beginning teachers and varied and interesting teaching in this university-wide program. These are not conventional freshman composition courses, but full-fledged academic seminars, often designed by graduate students themselves. The courses are writing-intensive and may fall under such general rubrics as “Portraits of the Self,” “American Literature and Culture,” “Shakespeare” and “Cultural Studies,” among others. A graduate student may also serve as a teaching assistant for an undergraduate lecture course taught by a member of the Department of Literatures in English faculty.
All MFA degree candidates are guaranteed two years of funding (including a stipend , a full tuition fellowship and student health insurance).
Optional MFA Lecturer Appointments Degree recipients who are actively seeking outside funding/employment are eligible to apply to teach for one or two years as a lecturer. These positions are made possible by an endowment established by the late Philip H. Freund ’29 and a bequest from the Truman Capote Literary Trust.
The application for Fall 2025 admission will open on September 15, 2024 and will close on December 1, 2024 at 11:59pm EST. Please note that staff support is available M-F 9am-4pm.
Eligibility : Applicants must currently have, or expect to have, at least a BA or BS (or the equivalent) in any field before matriculation. International students, please verify degree equivalency here . Applicants are not required to take the GRE test or meet a specified GPA minimum.
To Apply: All applications and supplemental materials must be submitted on-line through the Graduate School application system . While completing your application, you may save and edit your data. Once you click “submit,” your application will be closed for changes. Please proofread your materials carefully. Once you pay and click submit, you will not be able to make any changes or revisions.
DEADLINE: Dec. 1, 11:59 p.m. EST . This deadline is firm. No applications, additional materials or revisions will be accepted after the deadline.
MFA Program Application Requirements Checklist
General Information for All Applicants
Application Fee: Visit the Graduate School for information regarding application fees , payment options, and fee waivers . Please do not send inquires regarding fee waivers.
Document Identification: Please do not put your social security number on any documents.
Status Inquiries: Once you submit your application, you will receive a confirmation email. You will also be able to check the completion status of your application in your account. If vital sections of your application are missing, we will notify you via email after the Dec. 1 deadline and allow you ample time to provide the missing materials. Please do not inquire about the status of your application.
Credential/Application Assessments: The admission review committee members are unable to review application materials or applicant credentials prior to official application submission. Once the committee has reviewed the applications and made admissions decisions, they will not discuss the results or make any recommendations for improving the strength of an applicant’s credentials. Applicants looking for feedback are advised to consult with their undergraduate advisor or someone else who knows them and their work.
Review Process: Application review begins after the submission deadline. Notification of admissions decisions will be made by email or by telephone by the end of February.
Connecting with Faculty and/or Students: Unfortunately, due to the volume of inquiries we receive, faculty and current students are not available to correspond with potential applicants prior to an offer of admission. Applicants who are offered admission will have the opportunity to meet faculty and students to have their questions answered prior to accepting. Staff and faculty are also not able to pre-assess potential applicant’s work outside of the formal application process. Please email [email protected] instead, if you have questions.
Visiting: The department does not offer pre-admission visits or interviews. Admitted applicants will be invited to visit the department, attend graduate seminars and meet with faculty and students before making the decision to enroll.
Transfer Credits: Transfer credits are not available toward the MFA program.
Admissions FAQ
Contact [email protected]
Many people have a talent for stories, but not everyone will become a successful author. In many cases, people simply need to hone their skills – and the best MFA creative writing programs are the key.
If you have an undergrad degree and are looking for the next step in your academic adventure, you’re in luck: We’ve scoured MFA creative writing rankings to find you the best programs.
Table of Contents
1. johns hopkins university – krieger school of arts & sciences.
Located in Baltimore, Maryland, Johns Hopkins is a world-renowned private research university. Their Master of Fine Arts in Fiction/Poetry is one of the best MFA creative writing programs anywhere. Students take courses and receive writing practice (in fiction or poetry) at the highest level. This MFA program also offers the opportunity to learn with an internationally renowned faculty.
The University of Michigan is a public research university – and the oldest in the state. Its Master of Fine Arts program is one of the best MFA creative writing programs in the country, exposing students to various approaches to the craft. While studying under award-winning poets and writers, students may specialize in either poetry or fiction.
The University of Texas at Austin is a well-known public research university with around 50,000 students at the graduate and undergraduate levels. It offers one of the best MFA programs for creative writing, aiming to enhance and develop its students’ artistic and intellectual abilities.
The University of Nebraska strives to provide quality, affordable education, including its online MA English program. Students can focus on four areas, including Creative Writing (which provides experiential learning in either poetry or prose).
Bay Path University is a private university with various programs at undergraduate, graduate, and doctorate levels (including women-only undergraduate programs). This creative non-fiction writing program is one of the first fully online programs in the country. No matter their location, students are able to develop their creative writing skills and knowledge – in a range of literary genres.
Brown is a world-famous Ivy League university based in Providence, Rhode Island. Its two-year residency MFA in Literary Arts is designed for students looking to maximize their intellectual and creative exploration. The highly competitive program offers extensive financial support. In fact, over the past 20 years, all incoming MFA students were awarded full funding for their first year of study (and many for the second year).
The University of Iowa is a public university located in Iowa City. As one of the most celebrated public schools in the Midwest, students learn under established professors and promising writers during their two-year residency program.
Cornell is an Ivy League university located in Ithaca, New York. This highly competitive program accepts only eight students annually, and just two from each concentration. Not only do students enjoy a generous financial aid package, but they also have the opportunity to work closely with members of the school’s celebrated faculty.
Founded in 1754, Columbia University is the oldest tertiary education institution in New York – and one of the oldest in the country. The school offers a Writing MFA in nonfiction, fiction, poetry, and literary translation. The fiction concentration promotes artistic and aesthetic diversity, with a diverse teaching staff and adjunct faculty from a wide range of diverse experience.
New York University (NYU) is known for delivering high-quality, innovative education in various fields. Located in the heart of NYC, the institution’s MFA in Creative Writing boasts celebrated faculty from poetry, fiction, and creative non-fiction backgrounds. This dynamic program fosters creativity and excellence through literary outreach programs, public reading series, a literary journal, and special seminars from visiting writers
As part of your master’s in creative writing program, you’ll usually need to complete a number of compulsory courses, along with certain electives. Common courses you’ll need to take include:
Besides the application form and fee, most MFA in creative writing programs have standard requirements. While the following are the most typical requirements, always check with the specific program first:
Make sure your resume includes all relevant information to showcase your interests, skills, and talent in writing.
MFA creative writing program selection committees look for applicants who are serious about writing. Therefore, they typically ask for at least one 10-20 page writing sample. The best samples showcase talent in your preferred area of writing (e.g., fiction, non-fiction). MFA poetry programs have varied sample requirements.
You’ll need to show your undergraduate degree (and possibly high school) transcript.
A statement of purpose is usually 1-2 pages and shows your passion for writing and potential to succeed in the program.
Most programs require letters of recommendation from academic or professional contacts who know you well.
Related reading: How to Ask a Professor for a Grad School Recommendation
Some MFA programs require GRE scores (though this is not the case for all universities). If you happen to need some assistance while studying for your GRE or GMAT, be sure to check out Magoosh for easy test prep!
As a creative writer with an MFA, you’ll have a variety of career options where your skills are highly valued. Below are a few of the common jobs an MFA creative writing graduate can do, along with the average annual salary for each.
A creative director leads a team of creative writers, designers, or artists in various fields, such as media, advertising, or entertainment.
An editor helps correct writing errors and improve the style and flow in media, broadcasting, films, advertising, marketing , and entertainment.
An academic librarian manages educational information resources in an academic environment (such as a university).
Copywriters typically work to present an idea to a particular audience and capture their attention using as few words as possible.
Technical writers are tasked with instruction manuals, guides, journal articles, and other documents. These convey complex details and technical information to a wider audience.
A writer usually provides written content for businesses through articles, marketing content, blogs, or product descriptions. They may also write fiction or non-fiction books.
A social media manager is responsible for creating and scheduling content on social media, and may also track analytics and develop social media strategies.
Journalists may work for newspapers, magazines, or online publications, researching and writing stories, as well as conducting interviews and investigations.
A public relations officer works to promote and improve the public image of a company, government agency, or organization. This is done through work such as: preparing media releases, online content, and dealing with the media.
Lexicographers are the professionals who create dictionaries. They study words’ etymologies and meanings, compiling them into a dictionary.
Yes, a number of institutions offer online master’s degrees , such as Bay Path University and the University of Nebraska. Online courses offer a high degree of flexibility, allowing you to study from anywhere – and often on your own schedule. Many students can earn their degrees while continuing with their current job or raising a family.
However, students won’t receive the full benefits of a residency program, such as building close connections with peers and working with the faculty in person. Some on-campus programs also offer full funding to cover tuition and education expenses.
Like anything, studying an MFA in Creative Writing and pursuing a related career can have its benefits as well as drawbacks.
Many people are talented but struggle sitting down to write. An MFA program will give you the motivation to meet your deadlines.
Writing can be a solitary pursuit. It can be hard to connect with others who are just as passionate about writing. An MFA program provides students with a community of like-minded people.
An MFA is one option that can help you find a teaching job at the university level. Unlike some majors that require a Ph.D. to enter academia, many post-secondary instructors hold an MFA.
Although an MFA in Creative Writing will provide several useful skills in the job market, these are not as marketable as some other forms of writing. For example, copywriting arguably has a wider range of job prospects.
There is a risk that your writing could become too technical or formulaic, due to the theories learned during your MFA. It’s important to know the theory, but you don’t want to let it limit your creativity.
A master’s in creative writing typically takes between 2-3 years to complete. Unlike other master’s degrees’ accelerated options, creative writing program requirements require a greater number of workshops and dissertations.
There are plenty of similar majors that can set you on the path to a career in the creative writing field. Consider alternatives like an MA in English , literature, humanities, media studies, and library sciences.
Related Reading: Master’s in Fine Arts: The Ultimate Guide
What can i do with an mfa in creative writing .
An MFA graduate could teach creative writing at a secondary or college level. They may pursue a career in advertising, publishing, media, or the entertainment industry. They could also become an author by publishing fiction, non-fiction, or poetry.
Having an MFA opens doors to a range of well-paid careers (more on that above). If you’re skilled in writing – and want to make a decent living with it – an MFA program might be an excellent choice.
First, consider whether an on-campus or online MFA program is best for you (depending on your lifestyle and commitments). Another key consideration is a university with renowned authors on their teaching staff who will give you the highest levels of training in creative writing. Also, consider your preferred focus area (e.g., fiction, poetry, nonfiction) .
An MFA in writing or creative writing is an advanced program that teaches students the art and practice of writing. During these programs, students hone their writing skills and equip themselves to publish their own work – or pursue a career in media, teaching, or advertising.
Yes! Teaching is one of the many career options an MFA provides . An MFA in creative writing can qualify you to be a teacher in creative writing (in schools or the higher education sector).
MFA creative writing programs are relatively competitive. Therefore, not all applicants will get into the program of their choice. However, if you are talented and ambitious that becomes more likely. Having said that, the most prestigious universities with the best MFA creative writing programs accept a small percentage of the applicants.
A number of creative writing programs are known for their famous faculty and excellent courses, like the Master of Fine Arts in Fiction/ Poetry from Johns Hopkins and the MFA in Literary Arts from Brown University . Outside the US, the most celebrated English program is likely the University of Cambridge’s MSt in Creative Writing.
An MFA is an intensive, highly-involved degree that requires a certain amount of dedication. Anyone with a passion for creative writing should find it rewarding and satisfying.
Whether you choose an MA or MFA in creative writing depends on your own interests and career ambitions. An MFA in creative writing is ideal for anyone passionate about pursuing a career in fiction, poetry, or creative non-fiction. An MA is a broader degree that equips students for a wider range of career choices (though it will qualify them for many of the same roles as an MFA).
Absolutely. However, studying for an MFA will equip you with a range of skills and knowledge that are extremely helpful in getting your work published, from honing your craft to submitting your manuscript to working with publishers.
An MFA in creative writing can help you land a range of jobs in the creative and literary fields. The highest-paying jobs for graduates with a master’s in creative writing include creative directors ($90,000) and technical writers ($78,000).
An MFA in creative writing program will hone your talents and develop the skills you need to become a successful writer. The best MFA creative writing programs will give you incredible knowledge of the field while developing your practical skills in fiction, non-fiction, or poetry.
The acceptance rate for the best MFA writing programs is fairly low, so it’s crucial to understand the requirements well and prepare thoroughly. To help you with your application, check out our guide to applying to grad school .
Lisa is a full-time writer specializing in career advice, further education, and personal development. She works from all over the world, and when not writing you'll find her hiking, practicing yoga, or enjoying a glass of Malbec.
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Degree requirements.
Learn more about the program by visiting the Department of English
See related Interdisciplinary Clusters and Certificates
Degree Types: MFA+MA
This new, fully-funded MFA+MA in Creative Writing and English program offers intimate classes, the opportunity to pursue both creative and critical writing, and close mentorship by renowned faculty in poetry, fiction, and creative nonfiction. Our three-year curriculum gives students time to deepen both their creative writing and their study of literature. Students will receive support for three academic years, and two summers, to complete both degrees – an MFA in Creative Writing and an MA in English.
Drawing on innovative scholarship, deep immersion in process, and cross-pollination between critical and creative texts, students will complete book-length thesis projects of their own design, either within or across genres, and a substantial essay on literary texts. The program's small size and attentive faculty will develop students' sense of literary context, while encouraging them to pursue the distinctiveness of their projects.
In addition to their studies, students will be guided in the teaching of creative writing and, through summer editorial work at TriQuarterly.org , the editing of a literary journal.
Students will pursue their work on our beautiful Evanston campus, amid artists, filmmakers, scholars and public intellectuals, with easy access to the vibrant literary arts scene of Chicago.
Additional resources:
Visit Master's Program Statistics for statistics such as program admissions, enrollment, student demographics and more.
Contact Nathan Mead Graduate Program Assistant 847-491-3341
The following requirements are in addition to, or further elaborate upon, those requirements outlined in The Graduate School Policy Guide .
Course | Title |
---|---|
ENGLISH 403-0 | Writers' Studies in Literature (three units) |
Five 400-level seminars in English | |
Introduction to Graduate Study | |
One additional graduate seminar at the 300- or 400-level, in English or another department or program. | |
Five MFA workshops (ENGLISH 496-0, ENGLISH 497-0, or ENGLISH 498-0) | |
ENGLISH 491-0 | Editorial Practicum |
ENGLISH 571-0 | Teaching Creative Writing |
ENGLISH 572-0: Manuscript Development Workshop |
May be taken outside the English department with permission of Creative Writing DGS.
Last Updated: September 12, 2023
The talent is there.
But the next generation of great American writers needs a collegial place to hone their craft.
They need a place to explore the writer’s role in a wider community.
They really need guidance about how and when to publish.
All these things can be found in a solid Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing degree program. This degree offers access to mentors, to colleagues, and to a future in the writing world.
A good MFA program gives new writers a precious few years to focus completely on their work, an ideal space away from the noise and pressure of the fast-paced modern world.
We’ve found ten of the best ones, all of which provide the support, the creative stimulation, and the tranquility necessary to foster a mature writer.
We looked at graduate departments from all regions, public and private, all sizes, searching for the ten most inspiring Creative Writing MFA programs.
Each of these ten institutions has assembled stellar faculties, developed student-focused paths of study, and provide robust support for writers accepted into their degree programs.
To be considered for inclusion in this list, these MFA programs all must be fully-funded degrees, as recognized by Read The Workshop .
Creative Writing education has broadened and expanded over recent years, and no single method or plan fits for all students.
Today, MFA programs across the country give budding short story writers and poets a variety of options for study. For future novelists, screenwriters – even viral bloggers – the search for the perfect setting for their next phase of development starts with these outstanding institutions, all of which have developed thoughtful and particular approaches to study.
So where will the next Salinger scribble his stories on the steps of the student center, or the next Angelou reading her poems in the local bookstore’s student-run poetry night? At one of these ten programs.
Here are 10 of the best creative writing MFA programs in the US.
Starting off the list is one of the oldest and most venerated Creative Writing programs in the country, the MFA at the University of Oregon.
Longtime mentor, teacher, and award-winning poet Garrett Hongo directs the program, modeling its studio-based approach to one-on-one instruction in the English college system.
Oregon’s MFA embraces its reputation for rigor. Besides attending workshops and tutorials, students take classes in more formal poetics and literature.
A classic college town, Eugene provides an ideal backdrop for the writers’ community within Oregon’s MFA students and faculty.
Tsunami Books , a local bookseller with national caché, hosts student-run readings featuring writers from the program.
Graduates garner an impressive range of critical acclaim; Yale Younger Poet winner Brigit Pegeen Kelly, Cave Canem Prize winner and Guggenheim fellow Major Jackson, and PEN-Hemingway Award winner Chang-Rae Lee are noteworthy alumni.
With its appealing setting and impressive reputation, Oregon’s MFA program attracts top writers as visiting faculty, including recent guests Elizabeth McCracken, David Mura, and Li-young Lee.
The individual approach defines the Oregon MFA experience; a key feature of the program’s first year is the customized reading list each MFA student creates with their faculty guide.
Weekly meetings focus not only on the student’s writing, but also on the extended discovery of voice through directed reading.
Accepting only ten new students a year—five in poetry and five in fiction— the University of Oregon’s MFA ensures a close-knit community with plenty of individual coaching and guidance.
Cornell University’s MFA program takes the long view on life as a writer, incorporating practical editorial training and teaching experience into its two-year program.
Incoming MFA students choose their own faculty committee of at least two faculty members, providing consistent advice as they move through a mixture of workshop and literature classes.
Students in the program’s first year benefit from editorial training as readers and editors for Epoch , the program’s prestigious literary journal.
Teaching experience grounds the Cornell program. MFA students design and teach writing-centered undergraduate seminars on a variety of topics, and they remain in Ithaca during the summer to teach in programs for undergraduates.
Cornell even allows MFA graduates to stay on as lecturers at Cornell for a period of time while they are on the job search. Cornell also offers a joint MFA/Ph.D. program through the Creative Writing and English departments.
Endowments fund several acclaimed reading series, drawing internationally known authors to campus for workshops and work sessions with MFA students.
Recent visiting readers include Salman Rushdie, Sandra Cisneros, Billy Collins, Margaret Atwood, Ada Limón, and others.
Arizona State’s MFA in Creative Writing spans three years, giving students ample time to practice their craft, develop a voice, and begin to find a place in the post-graduation literary world.
Coursework balances writing and literature classes equally, with courses in craft and one-on-one mentoring alongside courses in literature, theory, or even electives in topics like fine press printing, bookmaking, or publishing.
While students follow a path in either poetry or fiction, they are encouraged to take courses across the genres.
Teaching is also a focus in Arizona State’s MFA program, with funding coming from teaching assistantships in the school’s English department. Other exciting teaching opportunities include teaching abroad in locations around the world, funded through grants and internships.
The Virginia C. Piper Center for Creative Writing, affiliated with the program, offers Arizona State MFA students professional development in formal and informal ways.
The Distinguished Writers Series and Desert Nights, Rising Stars Conference bring world-class writers to campus, allowing students to interact with some of the greatest in the profession. Acclaimed writer and poet Alberto Ríos directs the Piper Center.
Arizona State transitions students to the world after graduation through internships with publishers like Four Way Books.
Its commitment to the student experience and its history of producing acclaimed writers—recent examples include Tayari Jones (Oprah’s Book Club, 2018; Women’s Prize for Fiction, 2019), Venita Blackburn ( Prairie Schooner Book Prize, 2018), and Hugh Martin ( Iowa Review Jeff Sharlet Award for Veterans)—make Arizona State University’s MFA a consistent leader among degree programs.
The University of Texas at Austin’s MFA program, the Michener Center for Writers, maintains one of the most vibrant, exciting, active literary faculties of any MFA program.
Denis Johnson D.A. Powell, Geoff Dyer, Natasha Trethewey, Margot Livesey, Ben Fountain: the list of recent guest faculty boasts some of the biggest names in current literature.
This three-year program fully funds candidates without teaching fellowships or assistantships; the goal is for students to focus entirely on their writing.
More genre tracks at the Michener Center mean students can choose two focus areas, a primary and secondary, from Fiction, Poetry, Screenwriting, and Playwriting.
The Michener Center for Writers plays a prominent role in contemporary writing of all kinds.
The hip, student-edited Bat City Review accepts work of all genres, visual art, cross genres, collaborative, and experimental pieces.
Recent events for illustrious alumni include New Yorker publications, an Oprah Book Club selection, a screenwriting prize, and a 2021 Pulitzer (for visiting faculty member Mitchell Jackson).
In this program, students are right in the middle of all the action of contemporary American literature.
The MFA in Creative Writing at Washington University in St. Louis is a program on the move: applicants have almost doubled here in the last five years.
Maybe this sudden growth of interest comes from recent rising star alumni on the literary scene, like Paul Tran, Miranda Popkey, and National Book Award winner Justin Phillip Reed.
Or maybe it’s the high profile Washington University’s MFA program commands, with its rotating faculty post through the Hurst Visiting Professor program and its active distinguished reader series.
Superstar figures like Alison Bechdel and George Saunders have recently held visiting professorships, maintaining an energetic atmosphere program-wide.
Washington University’s MFA program sustains a reputation for the quality of the mentorship experience.
With only five new students in each genre annually, MFA candidates form close cohorts among their peers and enjoy attentive support and mentorship from an engaged and vigorous faculty.
Three genre tracks are available to students: fiction, poetry, and the increasingly relevant and popular creative nonfiction.
Another attractive feature of this program: first-year students are fully funded, but not expected to take on a teaching role until their second year.
A generous stipend, coupled with St. Louis’s low cost of living, gives MFA candidates at Washington University the space to develop in a low-stress but stimulating creative environment.
It’s one of the first and biggest choices students face when choosing an MFA program: two-year or three-year?
Indiana University makes a compelling case for its three-year program, in which the third year of support allows students an extended period of time to focus on the thesis, usually a novel or book-length collection.
One of the older programs on the list, Indiana’s MFA dates back to 1948.
Its past instructors and alumni read like the index to an American Literature textbook.
How many places can you take classes in the same place Robert Frost once taught, not to mention the program that granted its first creative writing Master’s degree to David Wagoner? Even today, the program’s integrity and reputation draw faculty like Ross Gay and Kevin Young.
Indiana’s Creative Writing program houses two more literary institutions, the Indiana Review, and the Indiana University Writers’ Conference.
Students make up the editorial staff of this lauded literary magazine, in some cases for course credit or a stipend. An MFA candidate serves each year as assistant director of the much-celebrated and highly attended conference .
These two facets of Indiana’s program give graduate students access to visiting writers, professional experience, and a taste of the writing life beyond academia.
The University of Michigan’s Helen Zell Writers’ Program cultivates its students with a combination of workshop-driven course work and vigorous programming on and off-campus. Inventive new voices in fiction and poetry consistently emerge from this two-year program.
The campus hosts multiple readings, events, and contests, anchored by the Zell Visiting Writers Series. The Hopgood Awards offer annual prize money to Michigan creative writing students .
The department cultivates relationships with organizations and events around Detroit, so whether it’s introducing writers at Literati bookstore or organizing writing retreats in conjunction with local arts organizations, MFA candidates find opportunities to cultivate a community role and public persona as a writer.
What happens after graduation tells the big story of this program. Michigan produces heavy hitters in the literary world, like Celeste Ng, Jesmyn Ward, Elizabeth Kostova, Nate Marshall, Paisley Rekdal, and Laura Kasischke.
Their alumni place their works with venerable houses like Penguin and Harper Collins, longtime literary favorites Graywolf and Copper Canyon, and the new vanguard like McSweeney’s, Fence, and Ugly Duckling Presse.
Structure combined with personal attention and mentorship characterizes the University of Minnesota’s Creative Writing MFA, starting with its unique program requirements.
In addition to course work and a final thesis, Minnesota’s MFA candidates assemble a book list of personally significant works on literary craft, compose a long-form essay on their writing process, and defend their thesis works with reading in front of an audience.
Literary journal Great River Review and events like the First Book reading series and Mill City Reading series do their part to expand the student experience beyond the focus on the internal.
The Edelstein-Keller Visiting Writer Series draws exceptional, culturally relevant writers like Chuck Klosterman and Claudia Rankine for readings and student conversations.
Writer and retired University of Minnesota instructor Charles Baxter established the program’s Hunger Relief benefit , aiding Minnesota’s Second Harvest Heartland organization.
Emblematic of the program’s vision of the writer in service to humanity, this annual contest and reading bring together distinguished writers, students, faculty, and community members in favor of a greater goal.
One of the top institutions on any list, Brown University features an elegantly-constructed Literary Arts Program, with students choosing one workshop and one elective per semester.
The electives can be taken from any department at Brown; especially popular choices include Studio Art and other coursework through the affiliated Rhode Island School of Design. The final semester consists of thesis construction under the supervision of the candidate’s faculty advisor.
Brown is the only MFA program to feature, in addition to poetry and fiction tracks, the Digital/Cross Disciplinary track .
This track attracts multidisciplinary writers who need the support offered by Brown’s collaboration among music, visual art, computer science, theater and performance studies, and other departments.
The interaction with the Rhode Island School of Design also allows those artists interested in new forms of media to explore and develop their practice, inventing new forms of art and communication.
Brown’s Literary Arts Program focuses on creating an atmosphere where students can refine their artistic visions, supported by like-minded faculty who provide the time and materials necessary to innovate.
Not only has the program produced trailblazing writers like Percival Everett and Otessa Moshfegh, but works composed by alumni incorporating dance, music, media, and theater have been performed around the world, from the stage at Kennedy Center to National Public Radio.
When most people hear “MFA in Creative Writing,” it’s the Iowa Writers’ Workshop they imagine.
The informal name of the University of Iowa’s Program in Creative Writing, the Iowa Writers’ Workshop was the first to offer an MFA, back in 1936.
One of the first diplomas went to renowned writer Wallace Stegner, who later founded the MFA program at Stanford.
It’s hard to argue with seventeen Pulitzer Prize winners and six U.S. Poets Laureate. The Iowa Writers’ Workshop is the root system of the MFA tree.
The two-year program balances writing courses with coursework in other graduate departments at the university. In addition to the book-length thesis, a written exam is part of the student’s last semester.
Because the program represents the quintessential idea of a writing program, it attracts its faculty positions, reading series, events, and workshops the brightest lights of the literary world.
The program’s flagship literary magazine, the Iowa Review , is a lofty goal for writers at all stages of their career.
At the Writers’ Workshop, tracks include not only fiction, poetry, playwriting, and nonfiction, but also Spanish creative writing and literary translation. Their reading series in association with Prairie Lights bookstore streams online and is heard around the world.
Iowa’s program came into being in answer to the central question posed to each one of these schools: can writing be taught?
The answer for a group of intrepid, creative souls in 1936 was, actually, “maybe not.”
But they believed it could be cultivated; each one of these institutions proves it can be, in many ways, for those willing to commit the time and imagination.
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http://www.as.miami.edu/english/creativewriting/
The University of Miami’s MFA Program in Creative Writing offers a fully funded, two-year course of study in the writing of poetry, fiction, or cross-genre literature while providing substantial training in the teaching of creative writing and composition. Students may apply to receive a third year of funding, during which graduate students focus on professional development and publication as they continue to teach undergraduate writing courses. The program features a broad multilingual focus in a vibrant, multicultural city unlike any other. Enrollment is kept deliberately small to maximize student-teacher interaction, and faculty at UM are supportive of the linguistic and cultural differences that writers bring to their art.
The James Michener Fellowships and Teaching Assistantships support all our graduate students. Awards include a full tuition waiver and an annual stipend. MFA candidates teach one section of Introduction to Creative Writing per semester during their second year in the program or one section each of Creative Writing and Composition.
Students who proceed into a third year will teach Creative Writing and Composition, with additional professional development options in literary magazine editing and communications/public outreach. They will receive faculty mentorship towards professional development.
Graduates of the MFA in Creative Writing have gone on to publish award-winning novels, books of poetry, and creative nonfiction; have been awarded Stegner Fellowships and other residencies; and have gone on to find employment in teaching and publishing.
Code | Title | Credit Hours |
---|---|---|
Workshop Requirement | ||
Students must take 12 credits of workshop in the genre they were admitted to. | 12 | |
Creative Writing: Fiction III | ||
Creative Writing: Poetry II | ||
Form Requirement | ||
Students must take 12 credits of forms in the genre they were admitted to. | 12 | |
Form in Poetry | ||
Form in Fiction | ||
Thesis Requirement | ||
Master's Thesis | 6 | |
Required Electives | 6 | |
Total Credit Hours | 36 |
Third Year Option:
ENG 820 is required for third year students. Students make take up to 6 credits in electives during their third year.
Required electives must be literature or forms courses, or other graduate courses at the university.
Year One | ||
---|---|---|
First Semester | Credit Hours | |
or | Creative Writing: Fiction III | 3 |
or | Form in Poetry | 3 |
Elective | 3 | |
ENG 691 | TAs Only | 0 |
Credit Hours | 9 | |
Second Semester | ||
or | Creative Writing: Fiction III | 3 |
or | Form in Poetry | 3 |
Elective | 3 | |
Creative Writing (TAs Only) | ||
Credit Hours | 9 | |
Year Two | ||
First Semester | ||
or | Creative Writing: Fiction III | 3 |
or | Form in Poetry | 3 |
Master's Thesis | 3 | |
TAs Only | ||
Credit Hours | 9 | |
Second Semester | ||
or | Creative Writing: Fiction III | 3 |
or | Form in Poetry | 3 |
Master's Thesis | 3 | |
Creative Writing (TAs Only) | ||
Credit Hours | 9 | |
Total Credit Hours | 36 |
The MFA in Creative Writing Program provides its students with a thorough understanding of how to write publishable novels, collections of stories, and books of poetry in order to contribute to the global literary canon; a range of critical and craft-based strategies in order to attain their creative and artistic vision; the skills needed to establish their own expertise, voice and style within the literary genre of their choice; the necessary preparation for careers in the production of contemporary literatures and arts administration within and outside of the academy; and training to teaching in two- and four-year colleges and in research universities. In addition to guiding our students in the writing and revision of their creative theses, we work to assist them in publishing their books, developing a forum for the reading of these works, and obtaining appropriate employment.
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Your chance of acceptance, your chancing factors, extracurriculars, fully funded creative writing mfa programs.
I'm super into writing, and I wanna pursue an MFA in creative writing after I finish my undergrad. Are there any fully funded MFA programs out there that I should be considering? Thanks in advance!
Hey there! It's awesome that you're passionate about writing and want to pursue an MFA in creative writing. There are quite a few fully-funded MFA programs you can consider. When a program is fully-funded, it typically means that accepted students receive a stipend or tuition waiver, allowing them to complete the program without incurring any additional debt. Keep in mind, however, that the level of funding and resources may vary among different programs and institutions. Here are some prominent fully-funded MFA programs in creative writing:
1. University of Iowa – Iowa Writers' Workshop: This is one of the most prestigious creative writing programs in the United States and offers full funding for all students.
2. Cornell University: Cornell's MFA program is highly regarded and offers full funding, including a stipend, to all its students.
3. Vanderbilt University: Vanderbilt offers full funding, which includes tuition waivers and stipends, to all MFA students in creative writing.
4. University of Texas at Austin – Michener Center for Writers: This program offers generous fellowships to all its students, making it highly sought after.
5. University of Michigan: The MFA program at the University of Michigan offers full funding through a combination of teaching assistantships and fellowships.
6. The Ohio State University: The creative writing program at Ohio State provides full funding and support for its MFA students.
These are just a few examples, but there are many other fully-funded MFA programs out there. When looking at different programs, be sure to research the faculty, the program's reputation, the alumni network, and professional development opportunities in addition to funding. This will help you find the program that's the best fit for your writing goals and aspirations. Good luck!
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A fully funded M.F.A. program that combines creative and scholarly work, undergraduate teaching, and professionalization opportunities.
The M.F.A. Program in Creative Writing is nationally ranked and our graduates are the recipients of many distinguished awards and fellowships.
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Lillian-yvonne bertram.
Associate Professor, English Director, MFA Program in Creative Writing, English
Professor, English
3103 Tawes Hall College Park MD, 20742
Associate Professor, English
3120 Tawes Hall College Park MD, 20742
3122 Tawes Hall College Park MD, 20742
3234 Tawes Hall College Park MD, 20742
3113 Tawes Hall College Park MD, 20742
Lindsay bernal.
Academic Coordinator, MFA Program in Creative Writing, English MFA Program in Creative Writing, English
2116E Tawes Hall College Park MD, 20742
Michael collier.
Emeritus Professor, English
Elizabeth arnold.
3101 Tawes Hall College Park MD, 20742
The late Distinguished University Professor and state Poet Laureate Stanley Plumly founded the M.F.A. Program in Creative Writing at UMD in the late 1980s and served as its director for most of his teaching career at the university.
The Georgia Review hosts a digital memorial archive devoted to Plumly and his work, teaching, influence and life.
The Master of Fine Arts Program in Creative Writing offers concentrations in fiction and poetry and requires a creative thesis. The course requirements include both writing workshops and literature courses.
Course Requirements
Beginning in the second year, MFA students register for English 799 (thesis research) under the direction of a member of the creative writing faculty, write as a thesis a book-length manuscript of fiction or poetry.
Mentoring Credit
All MFA students are required to complete one credit of pedagogical or professional mentoring each semester: either ENGL878 or ENGL898.
Dear Prospective Students,
Our MFA program is committed to social justice and antiracism. Our workshop process decenters whiteness and amplifies BIPOC voices, as we aim to create a space of equity for writing and collaboration and encourage extending creative practice into the world. What is the writing that is happening now, that is looking to the future and creating a viable community? The answer starts in the work of your imagination, your dedication to the craft, and your sense that this matters beyond the act of writing. Our commitment is to you.
Each fall, we welcome three poets and three fiction writers into the MFA Program, a studio-based fine arts program devoted to the development and mentoring of the next generation of poets and fiction writers.
Our attention is to your original writing and to you, the writer; our aim is to help you become the writer you envision for yourself. As fully funded writers, selected by the program faculty from an applicant pool of over 200, you’ll spend two to three years taking workshops, literature courses, and creative forms courses, meeting one-on-one with our faculty, and gaining valuable experience teaching undergraduate workshops, academic writing, and literature courses.
Our varied individual teaching philosophies share the conviction that the hard work of drafting and revising original stories and poems is grounded in reading and studying exemplary works. Literary history, innovative poetic and narrative form, and the experience of the writer all come into play through the shaping hand of art.
During the second and third years of the program, MFA students develop a thesis (a book-length collection of poetry or short fiction, a novel, or a hybrid project) under the direction of the MFA faculty. Students have the opportunity to work closely with each program faculty member in the genre of concentration during their time at UMD.
Completion of the thesis culminates in the occasion of a thesis defense with several faculty members, and a celebratory public reading, at which each student is introduced by their faculty mentor.
The MFA core curriculum includes practica in teaching creative writing (in the first semester) and finishing the thesis (in the last semester), plus a set of professionalization courses to prepare you for a career in creative writing. Our program emphasizes one-on-one mentoring and personal attention to your development as a writer in the world.
The Writers Here & Now reading series, co-sponsored and -curated by the Jiménez-Porter Writers’ House (UMD’s undergraduate residential college devoted to creative writing), brings writers of national and international prominence to the University of Maryland each year, both to read and meet with students in the graduate and undergraduate workshops. Recent visiting writers include Leslie Nneka Arimah, Jennifer Chang, Jos Charles, Alexander Chee, Jennine Capó Crucet, Natalie Diaz, Danielle Evans, Ross Gay, Louise Glück, Kaitlyn Greenidge, Terrance Hayes, Mitchell S. Jackson, John Keene, Yiyun Li, Claudia Rankine, Cristina Rivera Garza, Evie Shockley, Ocean Vuong, and Javier Zamora. We also invite program alumni to read in the series and visit with the MFAs.
Our program faculty and alumni include recipients of the following awards and honors: ● Agnes Lynch Starrett Prize ● Amy Lowell Poetry Traveling Scholarship ● Guggenheim Fellowship ● Italo Calvino Prize ● National Book Award ● National Endowment for the Arts Literature Fellowship ● NAACP Image Award ● National Jewish Book Award ● National Poetry Series competition ● New York Public Library Young Lions Prize ● Rome Prize ● Rona Jaffe Foundation Writers’ Award ● Whiting Writers’ Award
They have received Stegner, Hodder, Radcliffe Institute, and Provincetown Fine Arts Work Center fellowships, and their work has been featured in the following publications: ● The Atlantic ● Best American Poetry ● Harvard Review ● Los Angeles Review of Books ● The Nation ● The New Republic ● The New Yorker ● New York Review of Books ● New York Times ● Paris Review ● Poetry ● Threepenny Review ● Washington Post ● Yale Review
Our alumni have started their own literary journals online and in print: ● The Account ● Asian American Literary Review ● AzonaL ● B O D Y ● Leavings ● Oversound ● Smartish Pace
They have continued their formal studies in doctoral programs at Florida State University, the University of Houston, the University of Illinois–Chicago, the University of Missouri, the University of Utah, and other top programs. And they have taught in universities, colleges, and high schools around the country and abroad, serving communities and fostering the literary arts.
We thank you for your interest in our program. We urge you to review the department website to get a further sense of whether or not the MFA at Maryland is right for you. And we wish you the very best in your writing.
Submit the complete application and all supporting materials by December 17, 2024 —for the Fall 2025 term. (We do not accept applications for the Spring term.) Please note that the system will close promptly at midnight, so you will be unable to edit your application past 11:59pm on December 17, 2024.
University of Maryland's Graduate Application Process
The University of Maryland’s Graduate School accepts applications through its application system . Before completing the application, applicants are asked to check the Admissions Requirements site for specific instructions.
As required by the Graduate School, all application materials are to be submitted electronically:
Note: We DO NOT require--or recommend--that applicants to the MFA Program in Creative Writing submit GRE scores.
The electronic submission of application materials helps expedite the review of an application. Completed applications are reviewed by a faculty admissions committee in each genre. The recommendations of the poetry and fiction committees are submitted to the Dean of the Graduate School, who will make the final admission decision. Students seeking to complete graduate work at the University of Maryland for degree purposes must be formally admitted to the Graduate School by the Dean.
Information for International Graduate Students
The University of Maryland is dedicated to maintaining a vibrant international graduate student community. The Office of International Students and Scholars Services (ISSS) is a valuable resource of information and assistance for prospective and current international students. International applicants are encouraged to explore the services they offer, and contact them with related questions.
The University of Maryland Graduate School offers admission to international students based on academic information; it is not a guarantee of attendance. Admitted international students will then receive instructions about obtaining the appropriate visa to study at the University of Maryland which will require submission of additional documents. Please see the Graduate Admissions Process for International Applicants for more information.
Applicants are encouraged to direct any technical issues and questions related to the admissions process to the Graduate School ([email protected]; 301-405-3644)
If, after reading this list, you still have unanswered questions, please contact us.
Poet shara mccallum mfa ’96 named 2023 guggenheim fellow.
The fellowship will support McCallum’s upcoming project, a collection of poems in response to Jamaican visual art.
Creative Writing M.F.A. alum is profiled in TIME on her newest novel, Family Lore .
The mystical and mundane meet in story inspired by Temim Fruchter's Eastern European family matriarchs.
English professor elizabeth arnold dies at 65, “bitter water opera" in briefly noted book reviews, professor lillian-yvonne bertram and hoa nguyen ’91 receive foundation for contemporary arts grants to artists, accepting submissions: sadat poetry and music for justice and peace competitions, umd creative writing at awp 2024, poetry nfts are having a moment, lillian-yvonne bertram to read from 'negative money', upcoming events, writers here and now: ama codjoe & hanna pylväinen, writers here and now: elizabeth arnold tribute reading, writers here and now: karen solie & latoya watkins.
The Master of Fine Arts at West Virginia University is a three-year program that combines work in a primary genre and at least one other genre with course offerings in literature, pedagogy and professional writing and editing. Genres include fiction, nonfiction and poetry. All Master of Fine Arts students receive a full tuition waiver and an assistantship, which includes a stipend valued at $16,750.
Our alumni have gone on to further graduate study in English, to careers in editing and publishing and to positions in academia. They have received awards such as the Olive B. O’Connor Fellowship at Colgate and the Emory University Creative Writing Fellowship, won national prizes like the Iowa Award for Poetry and the Association of Writers and Writing Programs Prize for Nonfiction and published books with Autumn House Press, Carnegie Mellon University, 42 Miles Press, Ohio University Press, University of Georgia Press, University Press of New England and William Morrow/Harper Collins, among others.
WVU’s MFA graduates have published in hundreds of literary journals, including prestigious venues such as AGNI , Southern Review , Gettysburg Review , Field , Prairie Schooner , Tar River Poetry , Ninth Letter , Northwest Review , Missouri Review , Hayden’s Ferry Review , Sewanee Review, The Journal , 32 Poems , Georgetown Review , Controlled Burn , Colorado Review, Pank, Malahat Review , Mid-American Review , The New York Times, Paste, Times, Chelsea , Washington Square , Laurel Review , Slant , New Orleans Review , and in the anthology Layers of Possibility: Healing Poetry . Recent MFA students have won Intro Prizes sponsored by the Association of Writers and Writing Programs and the GreenTower Press’s chapbook prize and have published book-length collections of poetry and fiction. Recent graduates have won honors such as the Iowa Poetry Prize and the Walt Whitman Award.
All MFA students in creative writing are fully funded and teach composition, with opportunities to teach creative writing in the third year. Our students engage in community outreach through the Appalachian Prison Book Project, a program that provides incarcerated people with reading materials; edit Hellbender Magazine , a national literary journal; assist with the West Virginia Writers’ Workshop; and help maintain WVU's Council of Writers. They also participate in our monthly reading series, MFA@123 (pictured above). Our program hosts readings by recognized writers, including Jayne Anne Phillips, Camille Rankine, Elizabeth Graver and Geffrey Davis. We also conduct the annual Sturm Writer-in-Residence program, a week-long program that hosts an author at WVU to give a reading and lead workshops with graduate students. Recent Sturm Writers-in-Residence have included Claire Vaye Watkins, Valerie Sayers, Oliver de la Paz, Paul Lisicky and Susan Straight.
Graduate Catalog Description Graduate Student Handbook
WVU’s MFA faculty members, Mark Brazaitis, Mary Ann Samyn, Glenn Taylor, Christa Parravani, Jenny Johnson and Brian Broome, have published more than 25 books and have won many prestigious prizes and honors:
Fully Funded MFA Programs in Creative Writing was originally published on ProFellow
Fully funded MFA programs in Creative Writing offer a financial aid package for full-time students that includes full tuition remission as well as an annual stipend or salary during the entire program, which for Master’s degrees is usually 1-2 years. Funding usually comes with the expectation that students will teach or complete research in their field of study. Not all universities fully fund their Master’s students, which is why researching the financial aid offerings of many different programs, including small and lesser-known schools both in the U.S. and abroad, is essential. To read more and see the full list, view the full article here.
Your Success Story Is Waiting. The Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing at Vanderbilt is a graduate degree program, combining the workshop/studio study of creative writing with the study of literature, with a particular emphasis on contemporary examples. Students specialize in either prose fiction or poetry. The M.F.A. curriculum is devoted to the development of creative writing skills and expertise, and to immersing the writing student in the lively culture of contemporary literature and letters. A portion of the curriculum is also devoted to the study of canonical literature and creative writers of earlier eras. The Association of Writers and Writing Programs has established professional standards for M.F.A. programs and supports the M.F.A. as the appropriate graduate degree for teaching creative writing at the university level.
The Creative Writing program has been a vital part of the Vanderbilt Department of English for nearly a century. Each year, a small, select class of talented writers of fiction and poetry enroll in Vanderbilt’s three-year, fully-funded M.F.A. in Creative Writing program. We invite you to join us as we continue to build upon the tradition of excellent writing at Vanderbilt.
Our faculty of distinguished creative writers works closely with eighteen M.F.A students—half of whom work in poetry, and half in prose—who are enrolled in the program at any one time. Since each class contains only six students, admission is highly competitive, and no one’s work gets lost or overshadowed.
The M.F.A program has been ranked among the top 15 M.F.A Programs in the country by Poets and Writers magazine, ahead of many better-known graduate programs. We earn high marks for the quality of our prize-winning faculty, for Nashville’s affordable cost of living, and for the financial support we give our students.
The application deadline for fall admission is December 1, 2024 . Applicants should complete their application by that day, using the electronic application form . On the Program page, applicants should indicate area of interest (fiction or poetry). Fore more information on how to apply, please visit our FAQ page .
Financial Aid
M.F.A. Degree Requirements
Check out our alumni books poster at the link below, which features various writers who studied in the Creative Writing program.
Alumni Books Poster
If all this has you thinking about picking up a new book, head to the Vanderbilt University Bookstore or visit their website here to view their selection.
If you join our three-year MFA program in 2024, you will receive fellowship support and/or teaching income in the amount of up to $31,518 in the first two academic years and up to $25,214 in the third, as well as full funding of your tuition, enrollment fees, and the health insurance premium for single-person coverage through the university. Tax obligations on your fellowship income will vary from student to student depending on other income earned during the tax year, U.S. vs. international status, and other factors. See below.
Projected Funding | Fall | Spring | Summer |
---|---|---|---|
$12,607 | $6,303.50 | $6,304 | |
$6,303.50 | |||
$6,303.50 | $6,303.50 | $6,304 | |
$6,303.50 | $6,303.50 | ||
$12,607 | $12,607 |
The above semester-based projections are not always distributed evenly each month due to payroll calendars and academic holidays, but reflect your total income over the academic semester . You will have limited teaching in your first academic year of study so that you can focus on your writing. In the spring of that first year, you will teach one creative writing workshop (introduction to fiction writing or poetry writing, depending on the genre of your acceptance). In your second year, you will teach one creative writing workshop each semester. We provide pedagogical training and peer support to help you build courses that meet our university and program requirements, but the courses are largely of your own design: you create the exercises, reading list, and course structure. We know of few MFA programs in the country that offer such an opportunity to graduate students.
We fund all of our MFA students at the same level during their time in our program. Students do not have to re-compete for funding during their years at UVA. Like awards and fellowships at most universities, our offer of fellowship and teaching support is contingent on your satisfactory academic performance and compliance with all applicable university, school, and departmental policies, including but not limited to those governing student conduct, academics, and the UVA Honor System .
At the beginning of your second year, you will declare whether you intend to stay for a third year or graduate the following May on an accelerated schedule. Approval for a third year of teaching will depend on performance in the MFA program, teaching evaluations and a demonstrated commitment to teaching, and, of course, adequate progress on your thesis project. For this third year we offer the standard teaching assistantship package at a 2/2 load (teaching wages for two classes each term), as well as full funding of your tuition, enrollment fees, and the health insurance premium for single-person coverage through the university. Students enrolled in third years can continue taking graduate-level coursework at the University of Virginia, though they do not generally enroll in our workshops. Students in a third year typically teach one section of a 2000-level creative writing course and three ENWR 1510 sections (Writing and Critical Inquiry) over the academic year.
Students who choose to graduate on an accelerated two-year schedule receive the same fellowship and wages outlined above but are not eligible to receive summer funding after they graduate in May.
Just like at any other US college or university, UVA fellowship support is considered reportable, taxable income by the IRS, as are teaching wages. See this Scholarship Tax Information page and the Student Financial Services page for more details on your reporting responsibilities. The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) requires that the University of Virginia apply specific federal tax withholding and reporting rules to payments made to international students and scholars, which vary depending on a student's home country.
We do not have dedicated program funds available for student travel, conference fees, summer projects, or literary research. Our students can apply for support through UVA's College and Graduate School of Arts & Sciences or the English Department on a case-by-case basis, but we cannot guarantee these other funds at acceptance. As a program, we have focused on building a solid and equitable core funding package, but we continue to look for new ways to support MFA students who wish to take their studies beyond the confines of UVA.
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Art is Expensive. Your Education doesn't have to be.
Many schools have rolling admissions, which means you can start a program in a few weeks!
Education is expensive, and a degree in art is no exception. Between the tough choices of paying back massive student loans from an undergrad degree and the financial doom of more loans from graduate school, it’s easy to say no to more schools. An MFA can be an expensive degree, and it's almost never a good idea to go into a lot of debt for this degree.
Suppose an alternative path existed? Picture attending university sans the burden of tuition fees. Imagine acquiring money as you pursue an MFA degree. Albeit it might seem somewhat fantastical, this scenario genuinely transpires.
The thing is, there are fully funded programs available out there for a wide variety of subjects—even those that fall under the “arts.” Some of the best schools in the country offer full funding as a recruitment tactic to make it easier to attract top talent and students. Many MFA programs fully fund their students, while others will fund based solely on merit.
Of course, it’s not like they’re just handing out free money. For the school to pay for education, students have to meet stringent admission requirements. But hey, if you’re willing to work hard and go the extra step to prove that you’re hungry, there are big prizes out there.
What is full funding , the school's side of the deal.
Getting into a fully funded MFA program is an awesome way to get an education, but its also a deal where both the school and the student have an obligation to fulfill. On the school's side, that usually means waiving the cost of tuition for the student. The definition of full funding varies from school to school when it comes to MFA programs. Generally, though, schools define it as covering the cost of tuition in addition to any combination of the following:
The amount a school can award depends mainly on how much “budget” it has for the program. The number of qualified applicants and the needs of individual students also play a big factor in how much is available to go around.
In truth, certain learners face rejection not due to a lack of qualifications, but rather because insufficient financial resources preclude their acceptance. The other reality is that some students are accepted into programs because of the student's own deep pockets - the school wouldn't have to pay for the student. Because of all this, program sizes are sometimes kept quite small - 10-12 students in total.
The phrase that schools like to use when it comes to full funding is “enough to live on.” This is the amount that they think is enough to live on as a student per year and is what determines the amount they award students as a stipend. An academic stipend is designed to replace the potential income you could be earning as an employee instead of being a student.
Examine the implications of the following scenario:
Suppose an MFA program grants a yearly stipend of $12,000 while concurrently absorbing tuition fees. Consequently, students are relieved from concerns regarding educational expenses (excluding textbooks and supplementary resources) but must still contend with housing, sustenance, and additional outlays. The stipend's intent is to alleviate these financial burdens.
Put another way, you’re not going to be rich off of a fully funded program, and you won’t be able to live like royalty. You’ll still have to be smart with your money, find affordable housing, and maybe eat instant ramen when the funds get low, but at least you won’t be going into MASSIVE debt.
If we look at the relationship here as Cost of tuition + Stipend = Employee salary , then it makes sense that a student in a fully funded MFA program is essentially being "paid" to go to school. What, then, must a postgraduate scholar undertake to satisfy their part of the agreement?
And while juggling all this work, most important of all, a student has to have strong grades and be a good student.
Contemplate the following perspective: The educational institution effectively bestows upon you a bursary (covering tuition fees) whilst concurrently remunerating your attendance (the stipend designated for living expenditures). Admittedly, the monetary value of certain stipends may be modest for subsistence; nonetheless, their cumulative worth equates to a minimum of $30,000 or more.
Numerous MFA programs exist nationwide; however, a mere handful boast full funding. To facilitate your search, we have endeavored to compile an assortment of the most exemplary programs across the nation.
Stipend amount offered: $30,500 Benefits Offered: Tuition, Health Insurance
John Hopkins University tops off our list as the school with the most generous teaching fellowship. With a substantial allocation of $30,500, this program ranks among the nation's most generously financed initiatives, transcending various fields, particularly within the realm of artistic disciplines. The two-year Master of Fine Arts in fiction and poetry offers intensive seminars focused on diverse readings, small workshops, one-on-one advising, and frequent interaction with published writers. Naturally, given its status as one of the nation's premier institutions, gaining admittance to the program proves highly challenging. Each year only four poets and four fiction writers are admitted. These lucky students are fully funded and they teach one class a semester for three semesters - giving them lots of time to refine their craft.
Stipend amount offered: $27,500 Benefits Offered: Tuition
The MFA in writing program at the University of Texas Michener is a three-year full-time program. Students are admitted based on their main field of concentration - fiction, poetry, playwriting or screenwriting. Each admitted student receives a fellowship of $27,500 from the Michener fellowship. The late author James Michener and his wife Mari Subasawa Michener put together this fellowship to support students as they progress in their studies. Students may also apply for professional development funds to attend writing conferences, residencies fund research or travel, or to use as a summer stipend while writing a project. The money comes with a story: with each year's incoming student class, Michener would admonish, "Don't waste your time or my money." Great advice even 21 years after his death.
Stipend amount offered: $26,426 Benefits Offered: Tuition, health insurance
The Creative Writing Program at Cornell University offers concentrations in poetry or fiction. As a competitive program, only eight students are admitted each year, four in each concentration. This small size allows the school to offer generous financial support packages that fully funds each student. A notable advantage of this program entails each participant selecting a dedicated committee comprising two faculty members. These mentors collaborate with the student to tailor a curriculum aligned with the individual's pursuits. Furthermore, the program guarantees two years of financial support for all enrolled students. During the first year, students are assigned a graduate assistantship with EPOCH magazine, Cornell's publication of fiction, poetry, and more. In the second year, students are then assigned a teaching assistantship.
Stipend amount offered: $26,000 Benefits Offered: Tuition, health insurance
The Rutgers University - Newark MFA program is a studio/research program that allows writers to study literature as they work to create it. This program differs from other MFA programs in that it gives students a chance to fulfill the credit requirements by choosing unique Electives Concentrations, enabling students to work in a wide range of genres. For example, those that choose Literature/Book Arts will work with photographer Nick Kline to create and design a chapbook of their own work. Performance/Media Studies gives students the chance to study writing for the stage or television with playwright Michele Rittenhouse, and urban and narrative journalism with Rob Snyder, or jazz influences with Lewis Porter. This unique approach ensures that students will have an educational experience unlike anything else in the country. Students are typically offered a Teaching Assistantship and will be required to teach composition classes.
"Creative Writing has been a vital part of the Vanderbilt English Department for nearly a century," reads the first sentence on Vanderbilt's website. Unquestionably, Vanderbilt's MFA in creative writing stands among the nation's most esteemed and munificent programs, devised to cultivate gifted authors and poets. Nestled in Nashville, Tennessee, Vanderbilt epitomizes a harmonious fusion of avant-garde Southern culture and artistic vigor. The program extends comprehensive financial support to new enrollees; however, in their second year, students acquire the prospect of instructing an introductory creative writing workshop for a single term.
Stipen d amount offered: $22,830 Benefits Offered: Tuition, Health insurance
This school is located where St. Louis City meets St. Louis County, right across one of the largest urban parks in the country. Washington University in St. Louis is known throughout the region as an academic powerhouse. A distinguishing feature of this program is its status as one of the rare MFA initiatives that forego the GRE requirement for admission. Spanning a two-year duration with a group of 20 to 25 students, attendees are encouraged to delve into fiction, poetry, and creative nonfiction as their primary focus. Annually, the institution welcomes an eclectic assembly of poets, fiction authors, and nonfiction writers to the department, enriching students' exposure to a wide spectrum of literary creators. The school is able to offer all new students full and equal financial aid in the form of a University Fellowship, which allows students to live somewhat comfortably in a relatively inexpensive city. Additionally, there are two university wide fellowships available that graduate students can apply for that carry a stipend of $31,296.
Stipen d amount offered: $22,000 Benefits Offered: Tuition, Health insurance
The University of Michigan has a well proven reputation in academics and in the college sports world. The creative writing MFA is no different. The Helen Zell Writer's program is a two-year, fully funded MFA in creative writing where students focus on fiction or poetry. This program's faculty is what makes it stand out from other programs. They have collectively written, translated, and edited more than fifty books and won numerous awards. But beyond accomplishments and accolades, the program really seeks to get at the heart of why writing is important - "to push back against the darkness of intolerance and injustice, to give voice to perspectives that might otherwise be silenced." At the end of two years of courses, students must submit an MFA thesis. Following a successful defense of it, students are granted a third-year residency in Ann Arbor, writing and engaging in community service work of their choice, $25000 per fellow.
Stipen d amount offered: $21,493 (scaled) Benefits Offered: Tuition, Health insurance, Partial fee waiver
The University of Illinois, a renowned global research and educational establishment, houses the nation's third most extensive library, boasting in excess of eight million volumes—an impressive literary collection. The MFA program here provides students an opportunity to take classes and study with distinguished faculty. The program's paramount objective is to afford writers the opportunity and environment to refine their craft. Financial assistance is granted to all admitted students for the duration of the three year curriculum. Predominantly, this support is delivered via teaching assistantships, with a select number of fellowships accessible However, the funding is scaled. The first year of support is set at 33%, where students earn $10,586 and teach one class a semester. In the second and third years, students receive 67% appointments that take them to around $21,493. There are supplemental fellowship funds that are awarded to beef up the stipend.
Stipen d amount offered: $20,050 Benefits Offered: Tuition, Health insurance (medical, dental, vision)
The University of California, Irvine, ranks among the most favored institutions for inhabitants of Southern California. The MFA program here is designed for students that are committed to perfecting their craft. The programs primary aspiration is to guide its students in crafting enduring works of fiction or poetry. Each year more than 500 applicants apply to the program, and only twelve are selected. The program's intimate scale guarantees ample opportunities for students to engage with faculty members and obtain the requisite, individualized guidance for their endeavors. Within this three year initiative, participants are granted financial aid through teaching assistantships, including tuition fellowships for those residing out of state. These students are required to teach one undergraduate composition or creative writing class per quarter for a total of three courses per academic year.
Stipend amount offered: $20,000 Benefits Offered: Tuition
The University of Cincinnati is home to a thriving creative writing program that features the talents of distinguished award winning writers. Established in 1819 the University of Cincinnati's English graduate program has held a significant position within the institution for over a century, as one of the earliest to provide an advanced graduate curriculum. Students have the option to concentrate their pursuits within four primary domains: creative writing, literary and cultural studies, professional writing, and rhetoric and composition. Funding is based on academic credit, and the school offers a University Graduate Scholarship that awards financial aid based on academic merit. The graduate assistantship award provides a stipend in addition to a UGS award. Students will be required to teach one section of English Composition per term, with three office hours each week (in total, working for approximately 20 hours per week).
Stipen d amount offered: $20,000 Benefits Offered: Tuition, Enrollment fees, Health insurance
In addition to its esteemed reputation, the University of Virginia acknowledges the myriad challenges faced by students during their inaugural year in a novel program. As they acclimate to graduate life, forge new connections, keep abreast of coursework, and foster creativity, the initial year can prove taxing. Consequently, the University of Virginia distinguishes itself as one of the select programs that relieve first-year students of teaching duties, enabling them to concentrate on their writing. During the second year, the fellowship income drops to $10,000 from $20,000, but students earn $10,000 as teaching income for teaching one class per term (usually an introductory level creative writing workshops like Introduction to Poetry Writing or Fiction Writing). Funding is simultaneously allocated to all students, eliminating the need for them to vie for financial support throughout their tenure at UVA. Following the completion of their second year, students may pursue an additional year of teaching assistance. This third year of funding will depend on performance in the MFA program, teaching evaluations, and a successfully defended thesis at the end of the second year.
Stipen d amount offered: $19,700 Benefits Offered: Tuition
The University of Maryland's MFA program holds a prestigious national ranking, boasting alumni who have garnered numerous accolades and fellowships. It is part of a rich literary community and shares fiction and poetry readings at nearby schools like Georgetown, Howard, John Hopkins, George Mason, George Washington, American University, the PEN/Faulkner, and a variety of local bookstores. As a program designed to help aspiring writers perfect their ability to compose poems, stories, and novels, this program gives students a chance to study in intensive studios while doing practical work within their chosen genres. The MFA also requires students to study literature in order to broaden their perspectives. This is a highly competitive program. Each year only four fiction writers and four poets are admitted and fully funded by Teaching Assistantships. The funding arrangement generally anticipates a two year program completion, offering a stipend of $18100 in the initial year and $19700 in the subsequent year. First year students instruct a single class, whereas second year students assume responsibility for three classes during their final year.
Stipen d amount offered: $19,200 Benefits Offered: Tuition, Health insurance
The three year MFA program in Creative Writing and Environment is unique in the academic world because it goes beyond study in creative writing-poetry, fiction, nonfiction, and drama. Instead, it emphasizes the idea that writers can identify and explore their stories in the natural world and environmental imagination. Indeed, the program delves into the manner in which our surroundings mold our perspectives and subsequently influence our interpretation of narratives and visuals. This program is a combination of creative writing workshops, literature coursework, environmental fieldwork experience, interdisciplinary studies in courses outside of English, and one-on-one work with mentors. Ames is an affordable city, so the stipend offered by the program goes a long way to having a comfortable life as a student.
Stipen d amount offered: $19,000 Benefits Offered: Tuition, Health insurance
The Iowa Writer's workshop is an MFA program that results in the submission of a creative thesis (a book of poetry, novel, or a collection of stories). This program generally accepts up to fifty students each year - 25 in fiction and 25 in poetry. The program offers financial assistance to learners through teaching assistantships, research assistantships, and fellowships. These fellowships and assistantships usually provide tuition scholarships or full tuition remission. The quantity of the stipend is subject to change based on the duration of a learners involvement in the program. (For instance, a one-quarter time student will receive a smaller sum than a full-time student.)
Stipen d amount offered: $18,067 Benefits Offered: Tuition
The webpage for the MFA program in creative writing at the University of Florida, Gainesville greets you with a promise that if the program were half as warm and welcoming as the text on the website, you'd be happy here. Although it is among the most established writing programs in the country its longstanding reputation has kept it as one of the academic writing community's best kept secrets. This is a remarkable fact given the program's undeniable reputation for excellence in writing education. They are ranked highly by Poets & Writers and have a very high job placement rate. This program believes that good writing comes not just from talent and practice but also from the counseling that comes from other writers. To ensure alignment with faculty strengths and interests, the program actively recruits students who are the most suitable candidates. Students may not be the most accomplished writers, but they are accomplished in ways that the faculty can work with. Still, it's a competitive program as more than 500 people apply each year, and only six students are selected in each genre.
Stipen d amount offered: $18,000 Benefits Offered: Tuition, Student fee reduction, Health insurance
The creative writing program at the University of Oregon is a two-year residency with concentrations in poetry or fiction. Like many writing programs, this program emphasizes the importance of workshopping, integrating concentrated time for craft seminars and individualized reading tutorials. This is a rigorous program that is meant to challenge aspiring writers and is a program taught by faculty that went through similar rigorous apprenticeships. All incoming students are funded with a teaching appointment, meaning that they are not merely assistants to a class taught by a faculty member but instead are the ones solely responsible for the course. First-year students teach one course per 11-week term for a total of three courses in the year (usually an introduction to fiction, or poetry class). Second-year students usually teach a composition class on a similar schedule for a total of three courses in the year. 10 Graduate students are accepted by the program annually.
Stipen d amount offered: $18,000 Benefits Offered: Tuition, Student free reduction, Merit Raises
Purdue Universitys Creative Writing Program is a place where budding artists can work on their craft and seek the mentorship of internationally renowned faculty. Ultimately it is a program that is a destination for those that are interested in careers as writers, editors, teachers, non profit administrators, arts administrators, and more. With a remarkable student faculty ratio of approximately 3.5 to 1 this three year program is fully funded and considered one of the best in the country. In the first two years students focus on completing their coursework while dedicating the third year to their thesis. Additionally students are obligated to teach one course per semester. After the first year they can opt to teach extra courses to earn supplemental payments beyond the standard base stipend of $13000 for 10 months.
Stipen d amount offered: $16,500 (with a B.A) $17,000 (with an M.A.) Benefits Offered: Tuition
Located near the vibrant city of New Orleans, the MFA program at Louisiana State University is a three-year, generously funded program that is home to writers seeking to push their writing abilities. In a program designed for students to work closely with faculty, students are encouraged to find their unique voice as they work to write in traditional, hybrid, and new media genres. This MFA program encourages students to also seek learning outside of just English and literature. It emphasizes critical discussions about arts and culture, politics and history, and a wide variety of topics. MFA students are awarded a teaching assistantship and are only required to each class per semester. One of the true benefits of attending this program is its location. Because New Orleans and Baton Rouge are considered unique American cultural and artistic hubs, students are able to participate in many celebrations of art throughout the year.
Stipen d amount offered: $17,220 Benefits Offered: Tuition
At Syracuse University, aspiring writers can partake in a three-year MFA program, which provides a chance to learn, refine, and express their creative writing skills alongside fellow artists. This program is known for having a close-knit community that is genuinely concerned with helping each other grow in their artistic endeavors. It is a competitive program to get into, however. Only six poets and six fiction writers are admitted each year. But these twelve students get to work closely with eight full-time faculties and at least one renowned visiting writer each year. Each student is awarded a full tuition scholarship and a stipend - though some of these scholarships are configured to include teaching classes in the Writing Program. Ultimately, the belief of Syracuse University is that students should not be laden down with massive student loan payments when they graduate. "Talen, not wealth, is the sole prerequisite for admission."
Stipend amount offered: $16,120 (with master's degree) $14,808 (no master's degree) Benefits Offered: Tuition, Health Insurance Does not cover: Books, Course Fees
The University of Arizona prides itself on being a future thinking university with a focus on the world of tomorrow. Recognizing the importance of creative writing and humanities in society, this school offers a fully funded MFA program in Creative Writing. This three year program provides opportunities for research and travel, allowing students to focus on poetry, fiction, or nonfiction while also promoting genre crossing work. Generally, students are offered a graduate teaching assistantship position teaching one or two sections of first year writing (or creative writing) to undergraduates and are eligible to receive additional awards, funding, and research grants.
Stipen d amount offered: $15,965 Benefits Offered: Tuition
University of Miamis MFA is a program that prides itself in being located in a metropolis of polyglot communities this program places special emphasis on multilingual craft and gives writers a unique opportunity to hone their abilities in a vibrant multicultural city. This multicultural and multilingual approach allows students to write from different linguistic modalities such as regional dialects, and slang, and technical jargon. Students are encouraged to go beyond superficial language patterns and to really delve into the unique culture and history of different linguistic backgrounds. The James Michener Fellowships and Teaching Assistantships support all graduate students in the program. MFA students are required to teach one section of Introduction to Creative Writing per semester during their second year of the program. During the optional third year students are required to teach two sections of composition per semester and will receive faculty mentorship towards professional development.
Stipend amount offered: $15,000 (per year) Benefits offered: Tuition waiver, health insurance
Renowned for its MFA program, Arizona State University boasts distinguished faculty members and accomplished alumni as evidence of its success. Through small classes, intimate workshops, and one on one mentoring, students are encouraged to push their writing abilities in a number of different genres. When students are admitted to the program and submit a teacher assistantship application, they are awarded a teaching assistantship and stipend. Each teaching assistantship carries a three course per year load. Students in Arizona State Universitys MFA program must enroll in a minimum of six credit hours each semester. Students of the program also have additional opportunities to receive creative research fellowships, attend conferences like the Desert Nights, Rising Stars Writers Conference, moderate panels at conferences, and more.
Stipend amount offered: $13,500 Benefits Offered: Tuition, Health Insurance Does not cover: Books, Course Fees
The University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa hosts a creative writing MFA program, featuring workshops, forms courses, and literature classes that encourage students to explore various writing styles. In addition to the programs academic excellence students choose UA for its distinguished reputation as one of the most esteemed schools in the state. This program guarantees up to four years of full financial support. Students that are accepted into the program automatically qualify for graduate assistantships which also include a stipend of $13140 paid over nine months. All incoming students are also automatically considered for additional financial awards, including "Graduate Council Fellowships, McNair Fellowships, and Truman Capote Scholarships.
Stipend amount offered: $12,000 (per year for students with BA) $12,600 (with MA or equivalent) Benefits offered: Tuition waiver
This university overlooking the Ozark mountains has been home to academics for more than 140 years. Upon acceptance into the University of Arkansas MFA program students are obliged to teach two courses per semester. However, during their fourth year in the program, they are only required to teach one course. As a well-funded program, nearly all students of the program are awarded teacher assistantships. Students also have the opportunity to compete each year for several Walton Fellowships of $14,000 and several James T. Whitehead and Lily Peter Fellowships of $1,000 or greater. On top of this, learners worth $4,000 per year for up to four years may be awarded to academically qualified candidates. In other words, do well in your classes and earn money. Translation learners that are working on Middle-Eastern languages are also eligible for non teaching fellowships of $12,000 per year.
Score: 100.0
While most educational institutions require a sizeable commitment to complete degree programs, Pfeiffer University is an exception to the rule. The University offers a wide variety of online courses and degree programs that provide a more straightforward process for students who may have other commitments to fulfill. Like many other online degree programs, Pfeiffer University allows students in their online courses to work on thei
Niche.com awards it an overall grade rating of 'B-' for diversity, athletics, and value, and, according to the U.S. News and World Report, it sits at #44 in Top Performers on Social Mobility. The university offers courses both in traditional classroom settings and through the online format. A few of the most popular majors include Business, Health Professions, and Parks and Recreation. East Central University holds accreditation from the Higher Learning Commission and is recognized as an institution of high renown throughout the Oklahoma state college system.
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The Master of Fine Arts Program in Creative Writing at The Ohio State University is designed to help graduate students develop to the fullest their talents and abilities as writers of poetry, fiction and creative nonfiction. Creative writing classes are conducted as workshops or tutorials, and there are numerous opportunities for related study both within and beyond the Department of English. All students are fully funded for three years in a program that is well known for its sense of community and a faculty that is as committed to teaching as to their own writing.
Approximately 36 graduate students are taught by tenure track, visiting and affiliated (Film Studies) faculty, who also teach in the undergraduate program. Graduate student TAs teach introductory and intermediate special topics undergraduate creative writing courses, undergraduate literary publishing, as well as first-year and second-year writing (required courses for all Ohio State undergraduates). TAs teach two classes a year, one in autumn and one in spring. In addition, they have the opportunity to work as editors of Ohio State's prize-winning, nationally distributed literary magazine, The Journal , and to serve on the editorial staff of our two annual book prizes, one in poetry and one in prose.
Course offerings are varied and numerous. Special topics graduate workshops (in the long poem, in characterization, in literary translation, in humor writing, and so on) ensure that, in addition to "regular" workshops, opportunities abound for experimentation. Our graduate program includes coursework designed for "crossing over," such as, poetry workshops for MFA fiction writers or essayists with little experience writing poems; and "forms" classes in prosody, the novel, the memoir, novellas, for example.
Screenwriting for MFAs is offered regularly, and many students also elect to study playwriting or writing for performance as an elective. Some MFAs choose to pursue the Graduate Interdisciplinary Specialization in the Fine Arts (GISFA), which allows them to take graduate courses in other arts disciplines. Indeed, Ohio State's size and breadth offer our students the chance to explore many disciplines that enrich their study and practice of creative writing.
Core faculty.
Marcus Jackson is the director of the Creative Writing Program. He earned a BA from the University of Toledo and continued his poetry studies at New York University (NYU) and as a Cave Canem fellow. His poems have appeared in such publications as The American Poetry Review , The New Yorker and Tin House . His first collection of poetry, Neighborhood Register , was released in 2011, and his second collection, Pardon My Heart (Northwestern University Press/TriQuarterly Books) came out in 2019. Please visit Marcus Jackson's website . Email: [email protected]
Kathy Fagan Grandinetti is the author of five books of poems: Sycamore (Milkweed Editions, 2017); The Raft , a National Poetry Series Award Winner; MOVING & ST RAGE , winner of the 1998 Vassar Miller Prize for Poetry; The Charm (2002); and LIP (2009). Her poems have been widely anthologized and her work has appeared in such publications as Poetry , The Paris Review , FIELD , The Kenyon Review , Slate , Ploughshares , The New Republic and Blackbird . She is the recipient of fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA), the Ingram Merrill Foundation, The Frost Place and the Ohio Arts Council. Director of the Creative Writing Program, she continues to serve as advisor to The Journal , for which she and Michelle Herman were awarded the 2004 Ohioana Award for Editorial Excellence. Fagan is also series editor for The Ohio State University Press/ The Journal Wheeler Poetry Prize. Please visit Kathy Fagan's website . Email: [email protected]
Lee Martin is the author of the novels The Bright Forever ( a finalist for the 2006 Pulitzer Prize in Fiction); River of Heaven ; Quakertown ; Break the Skin ; and Late One Night . He has also published three memoirs: From Our House , Turning Bones and Such a Life . His first book was the short story collection, The Least You Need To Know , and a new collection, The Mutual UFO Network , was published in 2018. His craft book, Telling Stories: The Craft of Narrative and the Writing Life , came out in 2017. He is the co-editor of Passing the Word: Writers on Their Mentors. His fiction and nonfiction have appeared in such places as Harper's, Ms., Creative Nonfiction, The Georgia Review, The Kenyon Review, Fourth Genre, River Teeth, The Southern Review, Prairie Schooner, Glimmer Train, The Best American Mystery Stories and The Best American Essays . He is the winner of the Mary McCarthy Prize in Short Fiction and fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Ohio Arts Council. He was the winner of the 2006 Alumni Award for Distinguished Teaching from Ohio State, where he is a College of Arts and Sciences Distinguished Professor of English. Please visit Lee Martin's website . Email: [email protected]
Elissa Washuta is a member of the Cowlitz Indian Tribe and a writer of personal essays and memoir. She is the author of three books: Starvation Mode, My Body Is a Book of Rules , named a finalist for the Washington State Book Award, and White Magic , named a finalist for the 2022 PEN Open Book Award. With Theresa Warburton, she is co-editor of the anthology Exquisite Vessel: Shapes of Native Nonfiction, forthcoming from University of Washington Press. Her work has appeared in Salon , The Chronicle of Higher Education , BuzzFeed and elsewhere. She has received fellowships and awards from the National Endowment for the Arts, Artist Trust, 4Culture, Potlatch Fund and Hugo House. Please visit Elissa Washuta's website . Email: [email protected]
Nick White is the author of the story collection Sweet and Low and the novel How to Survive a Summer. His fiction and essays have appeared in The Kenyon Review, The Literary Review, Indiana Review, Guernica and elsewhere. A native of Mississippi, he earned a PhD in English and creative writing from The University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Please visit Nick White's website . Email: [email protected]
Angus Fletcher is the Black List and Nicholl award-winning screenwriter of MIDDLE EARTH (produced by Bob Shaye and Michael Lynne, directed by Michel Apted), WEE FREE MEN (produced by Allison Thomas and Gary Ross, based on the novel by Terry Pratchett), and VARIABLE MAN (produced by Isa Dick and Electric Shepherd, based on the novella by Philip K. Dick). He earned his PhD from Yale and has published articles on dramatic ethics and practice in Critical Inquiry, New Literary History, The Journal of the History of Philosophy, and a dozen other academic journals. His book Evolving Hamlet appeared on Palgrave in 2011, and his research and writing has been supported by grants from the National Endowment for the Humanities, the National Science Foundation, and the Mellon Foundation. Prior to coming to Ohio State, he taught at USC, Stanford and Teach for America. Email: [email protected]
Alumni of the MFA Program in Creative Writing have had their fiction, poetry and creative nonfiction appear in The Best American Essays, The Best New American Voices, The Best American Travel Writing, Tin House, Southern Review, Kenyon Review, Gettysburg Review, Glimmer Train, Creative Nonfiction, Fourth Genre, River Teeth, The Yale Review, Poetry, American Poetry Review, New Criterion, Field, Iowa Review, The Paris Review, Prairie Schooner, North American Review, Ploughshares, The Washington Post Magazine, The New York Times Magazine, Quarterly West, Epoch, Five Points , and other notable venues.
Below are just a few of these outstanding alumni poets and writers.
Maggie Smith is the author of Weep Up (Tupelo Press, forthcoming 2018); The Well Speaks of Its Own Poison (Tupelo Press 2015), winner of the Dorset Prize and the 2016 Independent Publisher Book Awards Gold Medal in Poetry Lamp of the Body (Red Hen Press 2005), winner of the Benjamin Saltman Award; and three prizewinning chapbooks. Her poems regularly appear in journals such as The Paris Review, The Southern Review, The Gettysburg Review, Plume, Virginia Quarterly Review, and Guernica . The recipient of fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Ohio Arts Council, the Sustainable Arts Foundation, and elsewhere, Smith is a freelance writer and editor in Bexley, Ohio, and she serves as a consulting editor to the Kenyon Review . (MFA, 2003) Maggie Smith's website .
Photo credit: Lauren Powell
Claire Vaye Watkins (MFA, 2011) is the author of the novel Gold, Fame, Citrus (2015) and Battleborn , a collection of stories (2012). Battleborn was awarded The Story Prize and the 2013 Dylan Thomas Prize and listed by the San Francisco Chronicle as one of the Best Books of 2012. Watkins was awarded an American Academy Arts & Letters Prize in 2012 and has received fellowships from the Writers’ Conferences at Sewanee and Bread Loaf. Her stories and essays have appeared in Granta , One Story, The Paris Review , Ploughshares , Glimmer Train , Best of the West 2011 , and Best of the Southwest 2013. Watkins is an assistant professor at Bucknell University and the co-director, with Derek Palacio, of the Mojave School, a non-profit creative writing workshop for teenagers in rural Nevada.
For more information about Watkins, her work, and the Mojave School, visit her website .
Photo credit: Heike Steinweg
Donald Ray Pollock (MFA, 2009) is the author of the novel The Devil All the TIme (2011) and Knockemstiff (2008), a collection of stories. Pollock grew up in southern Ohio. At 17, He dropped out of high school to work in a meatpacking plant and then spent 32 years employed in a paper mill in Chillicothe, Ohio. Knockemstiff won the 2009 PEN/Robert Bingham Fellowship, and The Devil All the Time was listed by Esquire as one of the Three Books Every Man Should Read. Pollock's work has appeared in Third Coast, The Journal , Sou’wester , Chiron Review , River Styx , Boulevard , Folio, Granta , The New York Times Book Review , Washington Square , and The Berkeley Fiction Review . He is the 2012 recipient of the Grand Prix de Littérature Policière, the most prestigious award for crime and detectives novels in France.
For more information about Pollock and his work, visit his website .
Yona Harvey (MFA, 2001) is a literary artist living in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. She is the author of the poetry collection Hemming the Water (Four Way Books: New York), which won the Kate Tufts Discovery Award from Claremont Graduate University.
She is also the recipient of an Individual Artist Grant in literary nonfiction from The Pittsburgh Foundation. Her poems can be found in jubilat, Gulf Coast, Callaloo, West Branch, and various journals and anthologies, including A Poet’s Craft: A Comprehensive Guide to Making and Sharing Your Poetry (Ed. Annie Finch). She lives not far from where jazz pianist and composer Mary Lou Williams grew up. Williams married the spiritual to the secular in her music, and is a regular muse in Yona’s writing. She is an assistant professor in the Writing Program at the University of Pittsburgh.
Friday, September 22, 2023, at 5 p.m. in Denney Hall 311
John Murillo is the author of the poetry collections Up Jump the Boogie (Cypher 2010, Four Way Books 2020), finalist for both the Kate Tufts Discovery Award and the Pen Open Book Award and Kontemporary Amerikan Poetry (Four Way 2020), winner of the Kingsley Tufts Poetry Award and the Poetry Society of Virginia’s North American Book Award and finalist for the PEN/Voelcker Award for Poetry, Believer Poetry Award, Maya Angelou Book Award, Hurston/Wright Foundation Legacy Award and the NAACP Image Award. His other honors include the Four Quartets Prize from the T.S. Eliot Foundation and the Poetry Society of America, two Larry Neal Writers Awards, a pair of Pushcart Prizes, the J Howard and Barbara MJ Wood Prize from the Poetry Foundation, an NYSCA/NYFA Artist Fellowship, and fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Bread Loaf Writers Conference, Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, Cave Canem Foundation and the Wisconsin Institute for Creative Writing.
Friday, November 3, 2023, at 4 p.m. in Denney Hall 311
Melissa Faliveno is the author of the debut essay collection TOMBOYLAND , named a Best Book of 2020 by NPR, New York Public Library, Oprah Magazine and Electric Literature and recipient of a 2021 Award for Outstanding Literary Achievement from the Wisconsin Library Association. Her essays, interviews and reviews have appeared in Esquire, Paris Review, Bitch, Literary Hub, Ms Magazine, Brooklyn Rail and Prairie Schooner , among others, and in the anthology SEX AND THE SINGLE WOMAN: 24 WRITERS REIMAGINE HELEN GURLEY BROWN’S CULT CLASSIC (Harper Perennial, 2022). Melissa is the Fall 2022 Distinguished Visiting Writer in the MFA program at UNC–Wilmington, was the 2020-21 Kenan Visiting Writer at UNC–Chapel Hill, and has also taught creative writing at Kenyon College, Sarah Lawrence College, Catapult and to incarcerated men, high school students and adults in and around New York City.
Friday, February 23, 2024, at 4 p.m. in Denney Hall 311
Thao Thai is a writer based out of Ohio, whose work has been published or is forthcoming in the Los Angeles Review of Books, WIRED, Real Simple, Catapult, The Sunday Long Read, Cup of Jo and other publications. Thao’s debut novel, Banyan Moon , is set to come out in June of 2023 (Mariner|HarperCollins). The novel has already been selected as an Indie Next pick, Indies Introduce Title, Book of the Month pick and the HarperCollins Lead Read of Summer 2023. Thao received her MFA in Creative Writing from the Ohio State University in 2012.
Friday, October 28, 2022 at 4 p.m. in Denney Hall 311
Daisy Hernández is the author of The Kissing Bug: A True Story of a Family, an Insect, and a Nation’s Neglect of a Deadly Disease (Tin House, 2021), which won the PEN/Jean Stein Book Award and was selected as an inaugural title for the National Book Foundation’s Science + Literature Program. The Kissing Bug was named a top 10 nonfiction book of 2021 by Time magazine and was a finalist for the New American Voices Award. Daisy is also the author of the award-winning memoir, A Cup of Water Under My Bed (Beacon Press, 2014), and co-editor of the classic feminist anthology, Colonize This! Young Women of Color on Today’s Feminism (Seal Press, 2002). Her essays and fiction have appeared in numerous publications, and she has reported for National Geographic, The Atlantic, The New York Times and Slate .
Friday, November 18, 2022 at 4 p.m. in Denney Hall 311
Yona Harvey is the author of the poetry collections You Don’t Have to Go to Mars for Love (Four Way Books, 2020), which won the Believer Book Award for Poetry, and Hemming the Water (Four Way Books, 2013), which won the Kate Tufts Discovery Award. She co-wrote Marvel’s World of Wakanda with Roxane Gay, as well as Black Panther & the Crew with Ta-Nehisi Coates. Yona has worked with teenagers writing about mental health issues in collaboration with Creative Nonfiction magazine and is a 2022 Guggenheim Fellow. She is also a 2001 alumna of the Ohio State University’s MFA in Creative Writing Program.
Friday, March 3, 2023 at 4 p.m. in Denney Hall 311
Jamel Brinkley is the author of A Lucky Man: Stories (Graywolf Press, 2018), which was a finalist for the National Book Award, the Story Prize, the John Leonard Prize, the PEN/Robert W. Bingham Prize and the Hurston/Wright Legacy Award; and winner of a PEN Oakland Award and the Ernest J. Gaines Award for Literary Excellence. Jamel’s writing has appeared in A Public Space, The Paris Review, Ploughshares, Gulf Coast, The Threepenny Review, Glimmer Train, American Short Fiction, The Believer and Tin House , and it has been anthologized twice in The Best American Short Stories . Jamel was also the 2016-2017 Carol Houck Smith Fellow at the Wisconsin Institute for Creative Writing, a 2018-2020 Wallace Stegner Fellow at Stanford University, and he has been awarded a 2021 O. Henry Prize.
Friday, October 1, 2021 at 4 p.m. virtually.
Laura van den Berg was born and raised in Florida. Her most recent collection of stories, I Hold a Wolf by the Ears , was published by FSG in July and named a “best summer read” by The New York Times, Time Magazine, Esquire, Harper’s Bazaar and Entertainment Weekly , among others. She is the author of two previous collections, The Isle of Youth (FSG, 2013) and What the World Will Look Like When All the Water Leaves Us (Dzanc Books, 2009) and the novels Find Me (FSG, 2015) and The Third Hotel (FSG, 2018). The Third Hotel was a finalist for the Young Lions Fiction Award, an IndieNext Pick, a Powell’s Books Indispensable Pick and named a “best book of 2018” by over a dozen publications. Laura’s honors include the Rosenthal Family Foundation Award from the American Academy of Arts & Letters, the Bard Fiction Prize, a MacDowell Colony Fellowship, a Civitella Ranieri Foundation Fellowship, a Pushcart Prize, an O. Henry Award and the Jeannette Haien Ballard Writer’s Prize.
Friday, November 5, 2021 at 4 p.m. in Denney Hall 311
McQueen’s novel When the Reckoning Comes was published with Harper Perennial , an imprint of HarperCollins . She’s also the author of And It Begins Like This , an essay collection. She received her MFA from Emerson College, her PhD from the University of Missouri, was the 2017-2018 Robert P. Dana Emerging Writer Fellow at Cornell College and is currently an Assistant Professor of English and Creative Writing at Coe College. She writes both fiction and nonfiction and has been published in Carve Magazine, Passages North, Bennington Review, Fugue, Ninth Letter, Grist, The Florida Review, Black Warrior Review, Fourteen Hills, New Orleans Review, Nimrod, New South and Booth . She’s won the Disquiet Literary Prize and the Walker Percy Prize in Fiction.
Friday, March 4, 2022 at 5:30 p.m. in Denney Hall 311
Ilya Kaminsky was born in Odessa, former Soviet Union in 1977, and arrived to the United States in 1993, when his family was granted asylum by the American government. He is the author of Deaf Republic (Graywolf Press) and Dancing In Odessa (Tupelo Press) and co-editor and co-translated many other books, including Ecco Anthology of International Poetry (Harper Collins) and Dark Elderberry Branch: Poems of Marina Tsvetaeva (Alice James Books). His work won The Los Angeles Times Book Award, The Anisfield-Wolf Book Award, The National Jewish Book Award, the Guggenheim Fellowship, The Whiting Award, the American Academy of Arts and Letters' Metcalf Award, Lannan Fellowship, Academy of American Poets’ Fellowship, NEA Fellowship, Poetry magazine's Levinson Prize, and was also shortlisted for the National Book Award, National Book Critics Circle Award, Neustadt International Literature Prize and T.S. Eliot Prize (UK).
Friday, March 26, 2021, at 4 p.m. on Zoom
Aimee Nezhukumatathil is the author of the New York Times best selling illustrated collection of nature essays and Kirkus Prize finalist, World of Wonders: In Praise of Fireflies, Whale Sharks, and Other Astonishments (2020, Milkweed Editions), which was chosen as Barnes and Noble’s Book of the Year. She has four previous poetry collections: Oceanic (Copper Canyon Press, 2018), Lucky Fish (2011), At the Drive-In Volcano (2007) and Miracle Fruit (2003), the last three from Tupelo Press. Her most recent chapbook is Lace & Pyrite , a collaboration of garden poems with the poet Ross Gay. Her writing appears twice in the Best American Poetry Series , The New York Times Magazine , ESPN , Ploughshares , American Poetry Review and Tin House .
Friday, September 13, 2019 at 4 p.m. in Denney Hall 311
Liza Wieland is the author of eight works of fiction and a volume of poems. She has received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Christopher Isherwood Foundation and the North Carolina Arts Council. She is the 2017 winner of the Robert Penn Warren Prize from the Fellowship of Southern Writers. Her novel, A Watch of Nightingales , won the 2008 Michigan Literary Fiction Award and her previous novel, Land of Enchantment , was a longlist finalist for the 2016 Chautauqua Prize. She lives in Oriental, North Carolina, and she teaches at East Carolina University.
Wednesday, September 18, 2019 at 4 p.m. in Denney Hall 311
Billy-Ray Belcourt (he/him) is a writer and academic from the Driftpile Cree nation. He is a PhD candidate and 2018 Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation Scholar in the Department of English and Film Studies at the University of Alberta; his doctoral project is a creative-theoretical one called "The Conspiracy of NDN Joy." He is also a 2016 Rhodes Scholar and holds an MSt in women's studies from the University of Oxford and Wadham College. In the First Nations Youth category, Belcourt was awarded a 2019 Indspire Award, which is the highest honor the Indigenous community bestows on its own leaders. In January 2020, he will be an assistant professor of Indigenous creative writing at the University of British Columbia.
Friday, October 18, 2019 at 4 p.m. in Denney Hall 311 MFA Workshop: Saturday, October 19 in Denney Hall 311
Born in St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands and raised in Apopka, Florida, Nicole Sealey is the author of Ordinary Beast , finalist for the PEN Open Book and Hurston/Wright Legacy Awards, and The Animal After Whom Other Animals Are Named , winner of the Drinking Gourd Chapbook Poetry Prize. Her other honors include a 2019 Rome Prize, the Stanley Kunitz Memorial Prize from The American Poetry Review, the Poetry International Prize and a Daniel Varoujan Award, grants from the Elizabeth George and Jerome Foundations, as well as fellowships from the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference, CantoMundo, Cave Canem, MacDowell Colony and the Poetry Project. Her work has appeared in The New Yorke r and elsewhere. Sealey holds an MLA in Africana studies from the University of South Florida and an MFA in creative writing from New York University. Formerly the executive director at Cave Canem Foundation, she is a 2019-2020 Hodder Fellow at Princeton University.
Friday, January 10, 2020 at 4 p.m. in Denney Hall 311
Robert W. Fieseler is the 2019 National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association "Journalist of the Year" and the acclaimed debut author of Tinderbox: The Untold Story of the Up Stairs Lounge Fire and the Rise of Gay Liberation , winner of the Edgar Award in Best Fact Crime and Lambda Literary's Judith A. Markowitz Award for Emerging Writers. He graduated co-valedictorian from the Columbia Journalism School and lives with his husband and dog in New Orleans.
Friday, January 24, 2020 at 4 p.m. in Denney Hall 311 MFA Workshop: Saturday, January 25 in Denney Hall 311
Dan Kois is the author of How to Be a Family and the co-author of The World Only Spins Forward .
Wednesday, September 12 at 4:30 p.m. at the Wexner Center for the Arts Bookstore
Amy Fusselman is a writer, artist and publisher based in New York City. She is the author of three books of nonfiction: Savage Park: A Meditation on Play, Space and Risk for Americans Who Are Nervous, Distracted and Afraid to Die (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2015); The Pharmacist’s Mate (McSweeney’s, 2013); and 8 (McSweeney’s, 2013). Her new book, Idiophone , was released from Coffee House Press on July 3rd, 2018. Her writing has appeared in ARTnews, Ms., The New York Times, Artnet, The Believer, McSweeney’s Internet Tendency, and The Atlantic , among other places. Fusselman is the publisher at Ohio Edit , a digital art and literary journal that offers 99-cent downloadable essays on thought-provoking topics.
Reading: Friday, September 14 at 4:30 p.m. in 311 Denney Hall. MFA Student Workshop: Saturday, September 15.
Danez Smith is a Black, queer, poz writer and performer from St. Paul, MN. Danez is the author of Don’t Call Us Dead (Graywolf Press, 2017), a finalist for the National Book Award, and [insert] boy (YesYes Books, 2014), winner of the Kate Tufts Discovery Award and the Lambda Literary Award for Gay Poetry. Danez is also the author of two chapbooks, hands on your knees (2013, Penmanship Books) and black movie (2015, Button Poetry), winner of the Button Poetry Prize. They are the recipient of fellowships from the Poetry Foundation, the McKnight Foundation, and is a 2017 National Endowment for the Arts Fellow. Danez's work has been featured widely including in/on Buzzfeed, The New York Times, PBS NewsHour, Best American Poetry, Poetry Magazine, and on the Late Show with Stephen Colbert. Danez is a member of the Dark Noise Collective and is the co-host of VS with Franny Choi, a podcast sponsored by the Poetry Foundation and Postloudness.
Reading: Friday, September 28 at 4:30 p.m. in 311 Denney Hall. MFA Student Workshop: Saturday, September 29.
Alice McDermott ’s first novel, A Bigamists' Daughter , was published to wide acclaim in 1982. That Night (1987), her second novel, was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, the National Book Award, and for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize. At Weddings and Wakes (1992), her third novel, became a New York Times bestseller. Charming Billy (1998), won the National Book Award. Ms. McDermott's other books include Child of My Heart and After This . Ms. McDermott received her BA from the State University of New York at Oswego, and her MA from the University of New Hampshire. She has taught at the University of California at San Diego and American University, has been a writer-in-residence at Lynchburg and Hollins Colleges in Virginia, and was lecturer in English at the University of New Hampshire. Her short stories have appeared in Ms., Redbook, Mademoiselle and Seventeen . The recipient of a Whiting Writers Award, Ms. McDermott is currently writer-in-residence at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore.
Reading: Friday, March 1 in 311 Denney Hall. Time: 4 p.m. MFA Student Workshop: Saturday, March 2.
Melissa Febos is the author of the critically acclaimed memoir, Whip Smart (St. Martin’s Press 2010) and the essay collection, Abandon Me (Bloomsbury 2017), which The New Yorker called “mesmerizing,” and was an Indie Next Pick and named a Best Book of 2017 by Esquire, Book Riot, The Cut, Electric Literature, The Brooklyn Rail, Bustle, Refinery29, Salon , and The Rumpus . The recipient of an MFA from Sarah Lawrence College, she is currently Assistant Professor of Creative Writing at Monmouth University. She serves on the Board of Directors of VIDA: Women in Literary Arts, the PEN America Membership Committee, and co-curated the Manhattan reading and music series, Mixer, for ten years. She curates literary events, teaches workshops, and speaks widely. The daughter of a sea captain and a psychotherapist, she was raised on Cape Cod and lives in Brooklyn.
Friday, April 13, 2018 at 4 p.m. in Denney 311
Tommy “Teebs” Pico is the founder and editor-in-chief of birdsong, an antiracist/queer-positive collective, small press and zine that publishes art and writing. The author of absentMINDR (VERBALVISUAL, 2014)—the first chapbook APP published for iOS mobile/tablet devices—Pico was a Queer/Art/Mentors inaugural fellow and a 2013 Lambda Literary fellow in poetry and has published poems in BOMB, Guernica, [PANK] and elsewhere. Originally from the Viejas Indian reservation of the Kumeyaay nation, he now lives in Brooklyn, where he co-curates the reading series Poets With Attitude (PWA) with Morgan Parker.
Friday, April 6, 2018 at 4 p.m. in Denney 238
Columbus native Gabe Habash comes back to read from his debut novel, Stephen Florida . Hanya Yanagihara, author of A Little Life , says, "In Stephen Florida , Gabe Habash has created a coming-of-age story with its own, often explosive, rhythm and velocity. Habash has a canny sense of how young men speak and behave, and in Stephen, he's created a singular character: funny, ambitious, affecting, but also deeply troubled, vulnerable and compellingly strange. This is a shape-shifter of a book, both a dark ode to the mysteries and landscapes of the American West and a complex and convincing character study." Gabe is currently the fiction reviews editor for Publishers Weekly . He holds an MFA from New York University.
Friday, February 23, 2018 at 4 p.m. in Denney 311 MFA Student Workshop: Saturday, February 24
Lina María Ferreira Cabeza-Vanegas received a 2016 Writer’s Award from the Rona Jaffe Foundation. Her nonfiction book, Don’t Come Back , was released in 2017 from Mad River Books, an imprint of the Ohio State Press. She has MFA degrees in both creative nonfiction and literary translation, both from the University of Iowa. She is also the author of Drown Sever Sing .
Reading: Monday, November 13, 2017 at 4:30 p.m. in 311 Denney Hall
Toni Jensen ’s first story collection, From the Hilltop , was published through the Native Storiers Series at the University of Nebraska Press. Her stories have been published in journals such as Ecotone , Denver Quarterly , and Fiction International and have been anthologized in New Stories from the South , Best of the Southwest , and Best of the West: Stories from the Wide Side of the Missouri . She’s working on a collection-in-progress, called Cowboyistan , about fracking and the sex trafficking of Indigenous women. She teaches in the Programs in Creative Writing and Translation at the University of Arkansas. She is Métis.
Reading: Saturday, November 4, 2017 at 5 p.m. in 311 Denney Hall MFA Student Workshop: Saturday, November 4, 2017
Garth Greenwell is the author of What Belongs to You , which won the British Book Award for Debut of the Year, was longlisted for the National Book Award, and was a finalist for six other awards, including the PEN/Faulkner Award, the James Tait Black Memorial Prize, and the Los Angeles Times Book Prize. A New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice, it was named a Best Book of 2016 by over fifty publications in nine countries, and is being translated into eleven languages. His short fiction has appeared in The New Yorker, The Paris Review , A Public Space , and VICE , and he has written criticism for The New Yorker , the London Review of Books , and the New York Times Book Review , among others. He lives in Iowa City.
Reading: Tuesday, October 24, 2017 at 4 p.m. in 311 Denney Hall
Molly Patterson was born in St. Louis and lived in China for several years. Her work has appeared in several magazines, including The Atlantic Monthly and The Iowa Review . She was the 2012-2013 Writer-in-Residence at St. Albans School in Washington, D.C., and is the recipient of a Pushcart Prize. Her debut novel, Rebellion , was published by Harper (HarperCollins) in August 2017.
Reading: Friday, October 20, 2017 at 4:30 p.m. in 311 Denney Hall MFA Student Workshop: Saturday, October 21, 2017
Bangladeshi American poet Tarfia Faizullah grew up in Midland, Texas. She earned an MFA from the Virginia Commonwealth University program in creative writing. Her first book, Seam (2014), won the Crab Orchard Series in Poetry First Book Award. Faizullah’s honors and awards include an Associated Writers Program Intro Journals Award, a Dorothy Sargent Rosenberg Prize, a Copper Nickel Poetry Prize, a Ploughshares’Cohen Award, and a Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference Margaret Bridgman Scholarship in Poetry. A Kundiman fellow, she lives in Detroit where she teaches at the University of Michigan and is an editor for the Asian American Literary Review and Organic Weapon Arts Chapbook Series. Her second book is Registers of Illuminated Villages (Graywolf Press, 2018).
Co-sponsored by project narrative.
Panel Discussion "A Conversation about Camille Dungy's Writing": Tuesday, September 19 at 4 p.m. in 311 Denney Hall Reading: Wednesday, September 20, 2017 at 11 a.m. in 311 Denney Hall
Camille T. Dungy is the author of four collections of poetry: Trophic Cascade (Wesleyan UP, 2017), Smith Blue (Southern Illinois UP, 2011), Suck on the Marrow (Red Hen Press, 2010), and What to Eat, What to Drink, What to Leave for Poison (Red Hen Press, 2006). Her debut collection of personal essays is Guidebook to Relative Strangers (W. W. Norton, 2017). Dungy’s honors include an American Book Award, two Northern California Book Awards, two NAACP Image Award nominations, and a California Book Award silver medal. Her poems and essays have been published in Best American Poetry, The 100 Best African American Poems, nearly thirty other anthologies, and over one hundred print and online journals.
April 7-9, 2017
Lia Purpura is the author of three collections of essays ( Rough Likeness, On Looking, and Increase ) in addition to a collection of translations and three books of poems. A Finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award (for On Looking ), she has also been awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship, an NEA Fellowship, a Fulbright Foundation Fellowship (Translation, Warsaw, Poland), and three Pushcart Prizes. Lia Purpura is Writer in Residence at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, in Baltimore, MD and teaches at the Rainier Writing Workshop in Tacoma, WA. Recently, she has served as Bedell Visiting Writer at the University of Iowa’s MFA Program in Nonfiction. www.liapurpura.com
October 22-23, 2016
Carl Phillips is the author of numerous books of poetry, including Reconnaissance , Silverchest , Double Shadow , Quiver of Arrows: Selected Poems 1986-2006 , and Riding Westward . His honors include the 2006 Academy of American Poets Fellowship, an Award in Literature from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the Pushcart Prize, the Academy of American Poets Prize, induction into the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation and the Library of Congress. Phillips served as a Chancellor of the Academy of American Poets from 2006 to 2012. He is Professor of English and of African and African American Studies at Washington University in St. Louis, where he also teaches in the Creative Writing Program.
September 23-25, 2016
Benjamin Percy is the author of three novels, the most recent among them The Dead Lands (Grand Central/Hachette, April 2015), a post apocalyptic reimagining of the Lewis and Clark saga. He is also the author of Red Moon (Grand Central/Hachette, May 2013) and The Wilding (Graywolf Press, 2010), as well as two books of short stories, Refresh, Refresh (Graywolf Press, 2007) and The Language of Elk (Grand Central/Hachette, 2012; Carnegie Mellon University Press, 2006). His craft book — Thrill Me: Essays on Fiction — will be published by Graywolf Press in October of 2016. And his next novel, The Dark Net , is due out in 2017 with Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. He also writes the Green Arrow and Teen Titans series at DC Comics. His honors include a fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Whiting Writers’ Award, two Pushcart Prizes, the Plimpton Prize, and inclusion in Best American Short Stories and Best American Comics. He is a member of the WGA screenwriters’ guild and has sold scripts to FOX and Starz. He currently has several film and TV projects in development.
November 20-22, 2015
Stuart Dybek is the author of three books of fiction: I Sailed With Magellan , The Coast of Chicago , and Childhood and Other Neighborhoods . Both I Sailed With Magellan and The Coast of Chicago were New York Times Notable Books, and The Coast of Chicago was a One Book One Chicago selection. Among Dybek’s numerous awards are a PEN/Malamud Prize “for distinguished achievement in the short story,” a Lannan Award, a Whiting Writers Award, an Award from the Academy of Arts and Letters, several O.Henry Prizes, and fellowships from the NEA and the Guggenheim Foundation.
January 29-31, 2016
Meghan Daum is the author of four books, most recently the collection of original essays The Unspeakable: And Other Subjects of Discussion . She is also the editor of Selfish, Shallow and Self-Absorbed: Sixteen Writers on the Decision Not To Have Kids . Her other books include the essay collection My Misspent Youth , the novel The Quality of Life Report , and Life Would Be Perfect If I Lived In That House , a memoir. Since 2005, Meghan has been an opinion columnist at The Los Angeles Times, covering cultural and political topics. She is the recipient of a 2015 Guggenheim Fellowship and is currently an adjunct associate professor in the M.F.A. Writing Program at Columbia University's School of the Arts.
February 19-21, 2016
Natalie Diaz was born in the Fort Mojave Indian Village in Needles, California. She is Mojave and an enrolled member of the Gila River Indian community. She is the author of the poetry collection When My Brother Was an Aztec (2012). Her honors and awards include the Nimrod/Hardman Pablo Neruda Prize for Poetry, the Louis Untermeyer Scholarship in Poetry from Bread Loaf, the Narrative Poetry Prize, and a Lannan Literary Fellowship. Diaz lives in Mohave Valley, Arizona, where she works with the last speakers of Mojave and directs a language revitalization program.
Thursday, March 26, 2015, Denney Hall 311 Food Writing Panel at 3 p.m. Reading at 4 p.m. Cooking Class (off-campus) at 6 p.m. (more details below and on this flyer [pdf] )
Organized like a cookbook, Books that Cook: The Making of a Literary Meal is a collection of American literature written on the theme of food. The literary works within each section are an extension of these cookbooks, while the cookbook excerpts in turn become pieces of literature — forms of storytelling and memory-making all their own. Each section offers a delectable assortment of poetry, prose and essays, and the selections all include at least one tempting recipe to entice readers to cook this book. Edited by OSU alumni Jennifer Cognard-Black and Melissa A. Goldthwaite , and including work by OSU creative writing professor Kathy Fagan .
Melissa Goldthwaite , Editor, Books that Cook Jennifer Cognard-Black , Editor, Books that Cook Colleen Leonardi , Managing Editor, Edible Columbus Mike Bierschenk , Food Writer, Optional Kitchen Nancy Yan , Lecturer, The Ohio State University Newark Jonathan Buehl , Associate Professor, Ohio State English
Jennifer Cognard-Black , Editor, Books that Cook Melissa Goldthwaite , Editor, Books that Cook Kathy Fagan , Poet and Professor, MFA Faculty, OSU
with Sarah Lagrotteria , Cooking Instructor and Recipe Editor for Edible Columbus at The Seasoned Farmhouse Cooking School in Clintonville
Saturday, November 8, 2014 at 8 p.m. OSU Bookstore - Barnes & Noble Event Space, Second Floor 1598 N. High Street
Gail Caldwell was the chief book critic for The Boston Globe and the winner of the 2001 Pulitzer Prize for Criticism. Her work was noted for “her insightful observations on contemporary life and literature.” She wrote A Strong West Wind: A Memoir (2006) about her native Texas, and Let's Take the Long Way Home (2010), a memoir of her friendship with author Caroline Knapp. Her latest book, New Life, No Instructions, was released in April 2014. She has a Samoyed named Tula.
Thursday, November 13, 2014 Mershon Auditorium/Wexner Center for the Arts 1871 N. High Street 5 p.m.
As of 2012, Zadie Smith has published four novels, all of which have received substantial critical praise. In 2003, she was included on Granta's list of 20 best young authors, and was also included in the 2013 list.[ She joined New York University's Creative Writing Program as a tenured professor on September 1, 2010. Smith has won the Orange Prize for Fiction in 2006 and her novel White Teeth was included in Time magazine's TIME: 100 Best English-language Novels from 1923 to 2005 list.
Presented by the President and Provost's Diversity Lecture and Cultural Arts Series, with co-host The Humanities Institute.
Friday, January 16, 2015 at 7 p.m. OSU Bookstore - Barnes & Noble Event Space, Second Floor 1598 N. High Street
Jamaal May is a poet, editor and educator from Detroit, where he taught poetry in public schools and worked as a freelance audio engineer and touring performer. He is the author of Hum (2013), winner of the Beatrice Hawley Award, and two poetry chapbooks ( The God Engine and The Whetting of Teeth ). A graduate of Warren Wilson's MFA program for writers, Jamaal teaches in the Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA program.
Friday, February 6, 2015 at 8 p.m. OSU Bookstore - Barnes & Noble Event Space, Second Floor 1598 N. High Street
Sarah Shun-lien Bynum is the author of two novels, Ms. Hempel Chronicles , a finalist for the 2009 PEN/Faulkner Award, and Madeleine Is Sleeping , a finalist for the 2004 National Book Award and winner of the Janet Heidinger Kafka Prize. The recipient of a Whiting Writers’ Award and an NEA Fellowship, she was named one of “20 Under 40” fiction writers by the New Yorker. She lives in Los Angeles and teaches in the Graduate Writing Program at Otis College of Art and Design.
January 25, 2014 OSU Bookstore - Barnes & Noble Event Space, Second Floor 1598 N. High Street 8 p.m.
Dan Chaon is the acclaimed author of Among the Missing , which was a finalist for the National Book Award, and You Remind Me of Me , which was named one of the best books of the year by The Washington Post , Chicago Tribune , San Francisco Chronicle , The Christian Science Monitor , and Entertainment Weekly , among other publications. Chaon’s fiction has appeared in many journals and anthologies, including The Best American Short Stories , Pushcart Prize , and The O. Henry Prize Stories . He has been a finalist for the National Magazine Award in Fiction, and he was the recipient of the 2006 Academy Award in Literature from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Chaon lives in Cleveland, Ohio, and teaches at Oberlin College, where he is the Pauline M. Delaney Professor of Creative Writing.
November 25, 2013 311 Denney Hall 164 W. 17th Avenue 3 p.m.
Born in Miami, Joy Castro is the author of the novel Hell or High Water and the memoir The Truth Book . She teaches literature, creative writing, and Latino studies at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, and her work has appeared in Fourth Genre , Seneca Review and The New York Times Magazine .
November 16, 2013 OSU Bookstore - Barnes & Noble Event Space, Second Floor 1598 N. High Street 7:30 p.m.
Terrance Hayes was born in Columbia, South Carolina in 1971. He received a BA from Coker College in Hartsville, South Carolina, and an MFA from the University of Pittsburgh writing program. He is the author of Lighthead (Penguin, 2010), which won the National Book Award for Poetry; Wind in a Box (2006); Hip Logic (2002), which won the 2001 National Poetry Series and was a finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Award; and Muscular Music (1999), winner of the Kate Tufts Discovery Award. He has received many honors and awards, including a Whiting Writers Award, a Pushcart Prize, three Best American Poetry selections, as well as fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship and the Guggenheim Foundation. He is professor of creative writing at the University of Pittsburgh.
October 20, 2013 OSU Bookstore - Barnes & Noble Event Space, Second Floor 1598 N. High Street 4 p.m.
Hope Edelman holds a bachelor's degree in journalism from Northwestern University and a master's degree in writing from the University of Iowa. She is the author of six nonfiction books: the international bestseller Motherless Daughters (1994), which was published in sixteen countries and translated into eleven languages; Letters from Motherless Daughters (1995), an edited collection of letters from readers; Mother of My Mother (1999), which looks at the depth and influence of the grandmother-granddaughter relationship; Motherless Mothers (2006), about the experience of being a mother when you don't have one; and The Possibility of Everything (2009), her first book-length memoir, set in Topanga Canyon, California, and Belize. In 2012 she collaborated with actors and filmmakers Martin Sheen and Emilio Estevez to help them write their father-son memoir, Along the Way .
To find dates, times and locations for these events, check the event calendar.
Epilog is an annual public performance which showcases creative work by third-year students in the MFA Program in Creative Writing. Epilog is an opportunity for the public to discover the prose and poetry that is being created by current MFA students. Following brief introductions by creative writing faculty, participating students give readings of their poetry, essays and stories in a formal, gala-like atmosphere. Chapbooks including selections from each of the presenting students are available at the event. This event is sponsored by the Writer's Guild.
Each Ohio State University MFA candidate is a member of Writers Guild, an organization dedicated to enhancing student life and the university community through fundraisers, social activities, industry panels and recognition of graduating classmates. Its board serves as a liaison between graduate students and faculty to discuss developments and communicate news.
The English Graduate Organization is a professional development, networking and advocacy group for all graduate students in the English department. EGO allows graduate students to have a tangible impact on departmental decisions and policies. Elected to specific committees, EGO officers coordinate academic and social events, serve on faculty committees and act as liaisons between graduate students and administration, providing a crucial voice in discussions that affect students’ day-to-day lives and future careers. In addition to promoting the interests of a dynamic graduate student body, EGO offers a valuable opportunity for its officers to prepare for service responsibilities in a profession that thrives on self-governance. EGO officers can vote at monthly English Department Council meetings, which all graduate students can attend.
The award-winning literary journal of The Ohio State University, The Journal contributes significantly toward the literary landscape of Ohio and the nation. The Journal seeks to identify and encourage emerging writers while also attracting the work of established writers to create a diverse and compelling magazine.
The Young Writers Workshop is a week-long summer program for high school students in Columbus City Schools, charter schools in the City of Columbus, South-Western City Schools, and Reynoldsburg City Schools. Each year, the Ohio State creative writing faculty choose 30 students from the application pool to come live on campus and study writing with writers from around the country, including current students in and alumni of the Department of English's MFA Program in Creative Writing. Students are selected based on the promise of their writing — we don’t ask for grades or letters of recommendation, just a statement of intent and writing samples. The program is entirely funded by a generous donor, and all participating students receive full scholarships.
Students attend daily workshops and courses taught by Ohio State faculty, graduate alumni and graduate students and have time to work on their own writing every day as well as attend readings, sessions with visiting writers in various fields, and other events, and participate in an open mic reading of their own work. The program concludes with a capstone event honoring the students and their families.
The deadline for all awards is Wednesday, February 21, 2024, at 11:59 pm EST . Please open the attachment below for award information, submission links and instructions.
To view a list of award winners, visit the Graduate Student Awards page.
Students in the MFA program must complete 39 semester hours of graduate-level course work, including:
All admitted students are fully funded for our three-year MFA program in Creative Writing. In addition, all students receive either a graduate teaching associateship, a Graduate School fellowship or a combination of the two. Funding is renewed on a yearly basis as long as the student maintains satisfactory academic progress.
The Graduate Admissions Committee for the Department of English will accept applications to the MFA program from students with an undergraduate degree from an accredited college or university.
The Graduate School requires that those admitted have an undergraduate grade point average of at least 3.0 on a scale of 4 (where 4.0=A) and at least a 3.0 on all previous graduate work. Our departmental criteria are higher: A GPA of at least 3.2 overall is preferred. Coursework in a foreign language is not required for admission.
If you have already earned an MFA in creative writing or are in the process of completing an MFA program in creative writing, you are not eligible for admission to our program.
Submit all following items through the Graduate Admissions Office :
Please note: As of autumn 2018, the Department of English at Ohio State no longer requires GRE scores for applications to its PhD or MFA programs.
Incomplete applications will not be considered.
If your native language is not English:
All admissions to the MFA program are made for the autumn semester only; the application portal for autumn 2025 will open on September 1, 2024. The application deadline for domestic applicants is December 2, 2024, and the application deadline for international applicants is November 25, 2024
Students must apply online and submit all materials (Graduate Admissions and Department requirements) electronically through the Office of Graduate Admissions . Please note that your recommenders will receive an email from the university 1-3 days after you submit your application and they should follow the instructions in that email for uploading their letters.
For questions that can't be answered by the information above, the Creative Writing Program can be reached by email or by phone ( 614-247-9670 ).
[pdf] - Some links on this page are to Adobe .pdf files requiring the use of Adobe Reader. If you need these files in a more accessible format, please contact [email protected] .
Fully Scholarship
Fully Funded Scholarships
Fully funded Master of Fine Arts (MFA) programs in Creative Writing provide aspiring writers with a unique opportunity to pursue their passion for writing while receiving financial support. These programs not only offer a platform for honing one’s literary skills but also eliminate the burden of hefty tuition fees and living expenses, making them an attractive option for many aspiring writers.
A fully funded MFA program covers tuition costs, and in some cases, also provides a stipend or assistantship that supports living expenses. This financial support allows students to focus entirely on their writing and literary endeavors without the distractions of financial constraints. Such programs are typically offered by universities or colleges that prioritize the development and cultivation of emerging literary talent.
By removing financial barriers, fully funded MFA programs attract a diverse range of students from various backgrounds. This diversity enhances the learning experience, as students are exposed to a multitude of perspectives and writing styles. Collaborative workshops and seminars foster a vibrant creative community where aspiring writers can exchange ideas, receive feedback, and develop their craft.
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The University of Arkansas offers a fully funded MFA program in Creative Writing that provides students with a comprehensive curriculum and financial support. Students admitted to this program receive full tuition waivers, a competitive stipend, and health insurance. The program focuses on fiction and poetry, providing workshops, seminars, and mentorship from esteemed faculty members. With a commitment to fostering literary excellence, the University of Arkansas MFA program prepares students for careers in writing and academia.
Link https://www.uark.edu/
Boise State University’s fully funded MFA program in Creative Writing emphasizes a close-knit community of writers and offers a range of genres including fiction, poetry, and non-fiction. Students receive a full tuition waiver and a teaching assistantship, allowing them to gain valuable teaching experience while honing their craft. The program features workshops, seminars, and individualized mentoring from acclaimed faculty members. Boise State University’s MFA program equips aspiring writers with the skills and knowledge needed to succeed in the literary world.
Link https://www.boisestate.edu/
Renowned for its prestigious writing programs, Brown University offers a fully funded MFA program in Creative Writing. This highly competitive program provides students with full tuition coverage, a generous stipend, and health insurance. With a focus on literary experimentation and innovation, the program encourages students to explore various genres and cross-disciplinary approaches. Students benefit from close relationships with renowned faculty members and participate in workshops, seminars, and public readings. Brown University’s MFA program cultivates the next generation of literary trailblazers.
Link https://www.brown.edu/
Arizona State University offers a fully funded MFA program in Creative Writing that provides students with the financial support they need to focus on their writing. This program offers fiction and poetry tracks and covers full tuition costs along with a teaching assistantship that includes a stipend and health insurance. Students work closely with accomplished faculty members in workshops, seminars, and mentoring sessions. Arizona State University’s MFA program prepares students to excel in their writing careers through rigorous training and an environment that fosters creative growth.
Link https://www.asu.edu/
The University of California Irvine’s fully funded MFA program in Creative Writing is highly regarded for its emphasis on literary excellence and diversity. Students admitted to this program receive full tuition coverage, a competitive stipend, and health insurance. The program offers workshops, seminars, and opportunities to engage with renowned visiting writers. With a focus on experimental and innovative writing, the University of California Irvine MFA program provides aspiring writers with the tools and resources to push boundaries and redefine literary norms.
Link https://uci.edu/
Florida Atlantic University’s fully funded MFA program in Creative Writing offers a supportive and nurturing environment for aspiring writers. Students admitted to this program receive full tuition waivers and teaching assistantships, providing valuable teaching experience alongside their studies. The program offers workshops, craft seminars, and opportunities to work closely with faculty mentors. With a focus on fiction, poetry, and creative non-fiction, Florida Atlantic University’s MFA program equips students with the skills and knowledge to succeed in the literary world.
Link https://www.fau.edu/
Georgia College & State University offers a fully funded MFA program in Creative Writing that aims to develop talented writers in a collaborative and diverse community. Students in this program receive full tuition waivers, a generous stipend, and health insurance. The program offers workshops, seminars, and opportunities to gain teaching experience. Faculty members provide individualized mentoring and support as students explore various genres and hone their craft. Georgia College & State University’s MFA program prepares writers for successful careers in publishing, academia, and beyond.
Link https://www.gcsu.edu/
The University of Houston’s fully funded MFA program in Creative Writing is renowned for its distinguished faculty and commitment to literary excellence. Students admitted to this program receive full tuition coverage, a competitive stipend, and health insurance. The program offers workshops, seminars, and opportunities to work on the esteemed literary journal, Gulf Coast. With a focus on fiction, poetry, and non-fiction, the University of Houston’s MFA program provides a dynamic and immersive environment for aspiring writers to thrive.
Link https://www.uh.edu/
The University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign offers a fully funded MFA program in Creative Writing that provides students with comprehensive support. Students admitted to this program receive full tuition waivers, a competitive stipend, and health insurance. The program offers workshops, seminars, and opportunities to engage with visiting writers and scholars. Students work closely with esteemed faculty members who provide individualized attention and mentorship. The University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign’s MFA program prepares writers for successful careers in writing, teaching, and publishing.
Link https://illinois.edu/
Iowa State University’s fully funded MFA program in Creative Writing offers a vibrant and collaborative community for aspiring writers. Students in this program receive full tuition waivers and teaching assistantships, allowing them to gain valuable teaching experience. The program offers workshops, seminars, and opportunities to participate in literary events and readings. With a focus on fiction and poetry, Iowa State University’s MFA program nurtures writers as they develop their craft and prepares them for careers in writing and publishing.
Link https://www.iastate.edu/
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M.f.a. creative writing.
English Department
Physical Address: 200 Brink Hall
Mailing Address: English Department University of Idaho 875 Perimeter Drive MS 1102 Moscow, Idaho 83844-1102
Phone: 208-885-6156
Email: [email protected]
Web: English
Thank you for your interest in the Creative Writing MFA Program at University of Idaho: the premier fully funded, three-year MFA program in the Northwest. Situated in the panhandle of Northern Idaho in the foothills of Moscow Mountain, we offer the time and support to train in the traditions, techniques, and practice of nonfiction, poetry, and fiction. Each student graduates as the author of a manuscript of publishable quality after undertaking a rigorous process of thesis preparation and a public defense. Spring in Moscow has come to mean cherry blossoms, snowmelt in Paradise Creek, and the head-turning accomplishments of our thesis-year students. Ours is a faculty of active, working writers who relish teaching and mentorship. We invite you in the following pages to learn about us, our curriculum, our community, and the town of Moscow. If the prospect of giving yourself three years with us to develop as a writer, teacher, and editor is appealing, we look forward to reading your application.
A Decade Working in a Smelter Is Topic of Alumnus Zach Eddy’s Poems
The region surrounding the University of Idaho is the ancestral land of both the Coeur d’Alene and Nez Perce peoples, and its campus in Moscow sits on unceded lands guaranteed to the Nez Perce people in the 1855 Treaty with the Nez Perce. As a land grant university, the University of Idaho also benefits from endowment lands that are the ancestral homes to many of the West’s Native peoples. The Department of English and Creative Writing Program acknowledge this history and share in the communal effort to ensure that the complexities and atrocities of the past remain in our discourse and are never lost to time. We invite you to think of the traditional “land acknowledgment” statement through our MFA alum CMarie Fuhrman’s words .
Three years to write.
Regardless of where you are in your artistic career, there is nothing more precious than time. A three-year program gives you time to generate, refine, and edit a body of original work. Typically, students have a light third year, which allows for dedicated time to complete and revise the Creative Thesis. (48 manuscript pages for those working in poetry, 100 pages for those working in prose.)
Our degree requirements are designed to reflect the real-world interests of a writer. Students are encouraged to focus their studies in ways that best reflect their artistic obsessions as well as their lines of intellectual and critical inquiry. In effect, students may be as genre-focused or as multi-genre as they please. Students must remain in-residence during their degrees. Typically, one class earns you 3 credits. The MFA requires a total of 54 earned credits in the following categories.
12 Credits : Graduate-level Workshop courses in Fiction, Poetry, and/or Nonfiction. 9 Credits: Techniques and Traditions courses in Fiction, Poetry, and/or Nonfiction 3 Credits : Internships: Fugue, Confluence Lab, and/or Pedagogy 9 Credits: Literature courses 12 Credits: Elective courses 10 Credits: Thesis
Students are admitted to our program in one of three genres, Poetry, Fiction, or Nonfiction. By design, our degree path offers ample opportunity to take Workshop, Techniques, Traditions, and Literature courses in any genre. Our faculty work and publish in multiple genres and value the slipperiness of categorization. We encourage students to write in as broad or focused a manner as they see fit. We are not at all interested in making writers “stay in their lanes,” and we encourage students to shape their degree paths in accordance with their passions.
During your degree, you will take Workshop, Techniques, Traditions, and Literature courses.
Our workshop classes are small by design (typically twelve students or fewer) and taught by core and visiting MFA faculty. No two workshop experiences look alike, but what they share are faculty members committed to the artistic and intellectual passions of their workshop participants.
Techniques studios are developed and taught by core and visiting MFA faculty. These popular courses are dedicated to the granular aspects of writing, from deep study of the poetic image to the cultivation of independent inquiry in nonfiction to the raptures of research in fiction. Such courses are heavy on generative writing and experimentation, offering students a dedicated space to hone their craft in a way that is complementary to their primary work.
Traditions seminars are developed and taught by core and visiting MFA faculty. These generative writing courses bring student writing into conversation with a specific trajectory or “tradition” of literature, from life writing to outlaw literature to the history of the short story, from prosody to postwar surrealism to genre-fluidity and beyond. These seminars offer students a dynamic space to position their work within the vast and varied trajectories of literature.
Literature courses are taught by core Literature and MFA faculty. Our department boasts field-leading scholars, interdisciplinary writers and thinkers, and theory-driven practitioners who value the intersection of scholarly study, research, humanism, and creative writing.
We teach our classes first and foremost as practitioners of the art. Full stop. Though our styles and interests lie at divergent points on the literary landscape, our common pursuit is to foster the artistic and intellectual growth of our students, regardless of how or why they write. We value individual talent and challenge all students to write deep into their unique passions, identities, histories, aesthetics, and intellects. We view writing not as a marketplace endeavor but as an act of human subjectivity. We’ve authored or edited several books across the genres.
Learn more about Our People .
The MFA experience culminates with each student writing and defending a creative thesis. For prose writers, theses are 100 pages of creative work; for poets, 48 pages. Though theses often take the form of an excerpt from a book-in-progress, students have flexibility when it comes to determining the shape, form, and content of their creative projects. In their final year, each student works on envisioning and revising their thesis with three committee members, a Major Professor (core MFA faculty) and two additional Readers (core UI faculty). All students offer a public thesis defense. These events are attended by MFA students, faculty, community members, and other invitees. During a thesis defense, a candidate reads from their work for thirty minutes, answers artistic and critical questions from their Major Professor and two Readers for forty-five minutes, and then answer audience questions for thirty minutes. Though formally structured and rigorous, the thesis defense is ultimately a celebration of each student’s individual talent.
The Symposium Reading Series is a longstanding student-run initiative that offers every second-year MFA candidate an opportunity to read their works-in-progress in front of peers, colleagues, and community members. This reading and Q & A event prepares students for the third-year public thesis defense. These off-campus events are fun and casual, exemplifying our community centered culture and what matters most: the work we’re all here to do.
All students admitted to the MFA program are fully funded through Teaching Assistantships. All Assistantships come with a full tuition waiver and a stipend, which for the current academic year is roughly $15,000. Over the course of three years, MFA students teach a mix of composition courses, sections of Introduction to Creative Writing (ENGL 290), and additional writing courses, as departmental needs arise. Students may also apply to work in the Writing Center as positions become available. When you join the MFA program at Idaho, you receive teacher training prior to the beginning of your first semester. We value the role MFA students serve within the department and consider each graduate student as a working artist and colleague. Current teaching loads for Teaching Assistants are two courses per semester. Some members of the Fugue editorial staff receive course reductions to offset the demands of editorial work. We also award a variety of competitive and need-based scholarships to help offset general living costs. In addition, we offer three outstanding graduate student fellowships: The Hemingway Fellowship, Centrum Fellowship, and Writing in the Wild Fellowship. Finally, our Graduate and Professional Student Association offers extra-departmental funding in the form of research and travel grants to qualifying students throughout the academic year.
Each year, we bring a Distinguished Visiting Writer to campus. DVWs interface with our writing community through public readings, on-stage craft conversations hosted by core MFA faculty, and small seminars geared toward MFA candidates. Recent DVWs include Maggie Nelson, Roger Reeves, Luis Alberto Urrea, Brian Evenson, Kate Zambreno, Dorianne Laux, Teju Cole, Tyehimba Jess, Claire Vaye Watkins, Naomi Shihab Nye, David Shields, Rebecca Solnit, Gabrielle Calvocoressi, Susan Orlean, Natasha Tretheway, Jo Ann Beard, William Logan, Aisha Sabatini Sloan, Gabino Iglesias, and Marcus Jackson, among several others.
Established in 1990 at the University of Idaho, Fugue publishes poetry, fiction, essays, hybrid work, and visual art from established and emerging writers and artists. Fugue is managed and edited entirely by University of Idaho graduate students, with help from graduate and undergraduate readers. We take pride in the work we print, the writers we publish, and the presentation of both print and digital content. We hold an annual contest in both prose and poetry, judged by two nationally recognized writers. Past judges include Pam Houston, Dorianne Laux, Rodney Jones, Mark Doty, Rick Moody, Ellen Bryant Voigt, Jo Ann Beard, Rebecca McClanahan, Patricia Hampl, Traci Brimhall, Edan Lepucki, Tony Hoagland, Chen Chen, Aisha Sabatini Sloan, sam sax, and Leni Zumas. The journal boasts a remarkable list of past contributors, including Steve Almond, Charles Baxter, Stephen Dobyns, Denise Duhamel, Stephen Dunn, B.H. Fairchild, Nick Flynn, Terrance Hayes, Campbell McGrath, W.S. Merwin, Sharon Olds, Jim Shepard, RT Smith, Virgil Suarez, Melanie Rae Thon, Natasha Trethewey, Philip Levine, Anthony Varallo, Robert Wrigley, and Dean Young, among many others.
The Creative Writing Program is proud to partner with the Academy of American Poets to offer an annual Academy of American Poets University Prize to a student at the University of Idaho. The prize results in a small honorarium through the Academy as well as publication of the winning poem on the Academy website. The Prize was established in 2009 with a generous grant from Karen Trujillo and Don Burnett. Many of our nation’s most esteemed and celebrated poets won their first recognition through an Academy of American Poets Prize, including Diane Ackerman, Toi Derricotte, Mark Doty, Tess Gallagher, Louise Glück, Jorie Graham, Kimiko Hahn, Joy Harjo, Robert Hass, Li-Young Lee, Gregory Orr, Sylvia Plath, Mark Strand, and Charles Wright.
Centrum fellowships.
Those selected as Centrum Fellows attend the summer Port Townsend Writers’ Conference free of charge. Housed in Fort Worden (which is also home to Copper Canyon Press), Centrum is a nonprofit dedicated to fostering several artistic programs throughout the year. With a focus on rigorous attention to craft, the Writers’ Conference offers five full days of morning intensives, afternoon workshops, and craft lectures to eighty participants from across the nation. The cost of the conference, which includes tuition, lodging, and meals, is covered by the scholarship. These annual scholarship are open to all MFA candidates in all genres.
This fellowship offers an MFA Fiction student full course releases in their final year. The selection of the Hemingway Fellow is based solely on the quality of an applicant’s writing. Each year, applicants have their work judged blind by a noted author who remains anonymous until the selection process has been completed. Through the process of blind selection, the Hemingway Fellowship Fund fulfills its mission of giving the Fellow the time they need to complete a substantial draft of a manuscript.
This annual fellowship gives two MFA students the opportunity to work in Idaho’s iconic wilderness areas. The fellowship fully supports one week at either the McCall Outdoor Science School (MOSS), which borders Payette Lake and Ponderosa State Park, or the Taylor Wilderness Research Station, which lies in the heart of the Frank Church River of No Return Wilderness Area. Both campuses offer year-round housing. These writing retreats allow students to concentrate solely on their writing. Because both locations often house researchers, writers will also have the opportunity to interface with foresters, geologists, biologists, and interdisciplinary scholars.
Idaho admitted its first class of seven MFA students in 1994 with a faculty of four: Mary Clearman Blew, Tina Foriyes, Ron McFarland (founder of Fugue), and Lance Olsen. From the beginning, the program was conceived as a three-year sequence of workshops and techniques classes. Along with offering concentrations in writing fiction and poetry, Idaho was one of the first in the nation to offer a full concentration in creative nonfiction. Also from its inception, Idaho not only allowed but encouraged its students to enroll in workshops outside their primary genres. Idaho has become one of the nation’s most respected three-year MFA programs, attracting both field-leading faculty and students. In addition to the founders of this program, notable distinguished faculty have included Kim Barnes, Robert Wrigley, Daniel Orozco, Joy Passanante, Tobias Wray, Brian Blanchfield, and Scott Slovic, whose collective vision, rigor, grit, and care have paved the way for future generations committed to the art of writing.
Situated in the foothills of Moscow Mountain amid the rolling terrain of the Palouse (the ancient silt beds unique to the region), our location in the vibrant community of Moscow, Idaho, boasts a lively and artistic local culture. Complete with independent bookstores, coffee shops, art galleries, restaurants and breweries, (not to mention a historic art house cinema, organic foods co-op, and renowned seasonal farmer’s market), Moscow is a friendly and affordable place to live. Outside of town, we’re lucky to have many opportunities for hiking, skiing, rafting, biking, camping, and general exploring—from nearby Idler’s Rest and Kamiak Butte to renowned destinations like Glacier National Park, the Snake River, the Frank Church River of No Return Wilderness Area, and Nelson, BC. As for more urban getaways, Spokane, Washington, is only a ninety-minute drive, and our regional airline, Alaska, makes daily flights to and from Seattle that run just under an hour.
For upcoming events and program news, please visit our calendar .
For more information about the MFA program, please contact us at: [email protected]
Department of English University of Idaho 875 Perimeter Drive MS 1102 Moscow, ID 83844-1102 208-885-6156
COMMENTS
Find out which universities offer full funding for MFA students in creative writing, including tuition remission, stipend, and health insurance. Compare the requirements, benefits, and application deadlines for 53 programs in the U.S.
1) Johns Hopkins University, MFA in Fiction/Poetry. This two-year program offers an incredibly generous funding package: $39,000 teaching fellowships each year. Not to mention, it offers that sweet, sweet health insurance, mind-boggling faculty, and the option to apply for a lecture position after graduation.
Find information about more than two hundred full- and low-residency programs in creative writing in our MFA Programs database, which includes details about deadlines, funding, class size, core faculty, and more. Also included is information about more than fifty MA and PhD programs. More
MFA in Writing. The Michener Center for Writers is the only Creative Writing M.F.A. program in the world that provides full and equal funding to every writer—yet it is our extraordinary faculty and sense of community that most distinguishes us. Our program is a three-year, fully-funded residency M.F.A. with a unique multi-disciplinary focus.
The fully funded Creative Writing MFA program features two years of study and options to focus on fiction or poetry. We love the program's esteemed faculty of published poets and fiction writers and the many opportunities to learn from acclaimed writers through the Zell Visiting Writers Series. This highly selective program accepts just nine ...
The Litowitz MFA+MA Program is the highest-funded graduate creative writing program in the country, providing a full three years of funding and free tuition, as well as health insurance and conference funding. Our faculty includes Natasha Trethewey, Chris Abani, Charif Shanahan, Juan Martinez, Daisy Hernández, and Sarah Schulman.
The Creative Writing Program offers the MFA degree, with a concentration in either poetry or fiction. MFA students pursue intensive study with distinguished faculty committed to creative and intellectual achievement. Each year the department enrolls only eight MFA students, four in each concentration. Our small size allows us to offer a ...
The University of Texas at Austin is a well-known public research university with around 50,000 students at the graduate and undergraduate levels. It offers one of the best MFA programs for creative writing, aiming to enhance and develop its students' artistic and intellectual abilities. 4.
Degree Types: MFA+MA. This new, fully-funded MFA+MA in Creative Writing and English program offers intimate classes, the opportunity to pursue both creative and critical writing, and close mentorship by renowned faculty in poetry, fiction, and creative nonfiction. Our three-year curriculum gives students time to deepen both their creative ...
University of Oregon (Eugene, OR) Visitor7, Knight Library, CC BY-SA 3.0. Starting off the list is one of the oldest and most venerated Creative Writing programs in the country, the MFA at the University of Oregon. Longtime mentor, teacher, and award-winning poet Garrett Hongo directs the program, modeling its studio-based approach to one-on ...
The 2019 MFA Index provides the basic specs of a program as well as some application information to help you stay on schedule, but many of the most important and unquantifiable aspects of a program—faculty, curriculum, precise funding structure, and so on—require more research. Much of this information can be found in the Poets & Writers ...
The University of Miami's MFA Program in Creative Writing offers a fully funded, two-year course of study in the writing of poetry, fiction, or cross-genre literature while providing substantial training in the teaching of creative writing and composition. Students may apply to receive a third year of funding, during which graduate students ...
Here are some prominent fully-funded MFA programs in creative writing: 1. University of Iowa - Iowa Writers' Workshop: This is one of the most prestigious creative writing programs in the United States and offers full funding for all students. 2. Cornell University: Cornell's MFA program is highly regarded and offers full funding, including a ...
The creative writing sample is the single most important element of a successful application to the MFA Program in Creative Writing. Of course, the Creative Writing faculty look closely at all of the other materials in the application file. ... Since our MFA students are fully funded they must remain enrolled on a full-time basis (taking at ...
All MFA students in creative writing are fully funded and teach composition, with opportunities to teach creative writing in the third year. ... MFA@123 (pictured above). Our program hosts readings by recognized writers, including Jayne Anne Phillips, Camille Rankine, Elizabeth Graver and Geffrey Davis. We also conduct the annual Sturm Writer ...
Nov 24, 2020. --. 2. Big thanks to The Workshop for putting this list together. They've done an incredible amount of research and due diligence to provide a list of MFA Creative Writing Programs ...
Fully funded MFA programs in Creative Writing offer a financial aid package for full-time students that includes full tuition remission as well as an annual stipend or salary during the entire program, which for Master's degrees is usually 1-2 years. Funding usually comes with the expectation that students will teach or complete research in ...
The M.F.A. in Creative Writing. The Creative Writing program has been a vital part of the Vanderbilt Department of English for nearly a century. Each year, a small, select class of talented writers of fiction and poetry enroll in Vanderbilt's three-year, fully-funded M.F.A. in Creative Writing program.
FINANCIAL SUPPORT If you join our three-year MFA program in 2024, you will receive fellowship support and/or teaching income in the amount of up to $31,518 in the first two academic years and up to $25,214 in the third, as well as full funding of your tuition, enrollment fees, and the health insurance premium for single-person coverage through the university.
The University of Michigan has a well proven reputation in academics and in the college sports world. The creative writing MFA is no different. The Helen Zell Writer's program is a two-year, fully funded MFA in creative writing where students focus on fiction or poetry. This program's faculty is what makes it stand out from other programs.
All admitted students are fully funded for our three-year MFA program in Creative Writing. In addition, all students receive either a graduate teaching associateship, a Graduate School fellowship or a combination of the two. Funding is renewed on a yearly basis as long as the student maintains satisfactory academic progress.
Boise State University: Boise State University's fully funded MFA program in Creative Writing emphasizes a close-knit community of writers and offers a range of genres including fiction, poetry, and non-fiction. Students receive a full tuition waiver and a teaching assistantship, allowing them to gain valuable teaching experience while honing ...
Thank you for your interest in the Creative Writing MFA Program at University of Idaho: the premier fully funded, three-year MFA program in the Northwest. ... All students admitted to the MFA program are fully funded through Teaching Assistantships. All Assistantships come with a full tuition waiver and a stipend, which for the current academic ...