MFA Program

B.A. Program

How to Apply

Financial Aid

Contact Us

 

 

Home

 

MFA Program

 

B.A. Program

 

How to Apply

 

Financial Aid

 

Contact Us

 

Faculty

 

Visiting Writers

 

Catalogs

 

Class Schedules

 

GCSU News

 

Historic Milledgeville

 

MFA FAQ

 

Sample three-year schedule

 

Learn more about our students and graduates

 

 

Welcome! Prospective students may have noticed our program mentioned in the Poets & Writers (Nov/Dec 2008) article “Show Me the Money: A Roundup of the Top-Funded MFA Programs” by Seth Abramson. That article, however, was unfortunately unaware of our current assistantship information.

 

Our annual stipend is now $8,750, not the $7,600 that was reported in the article, and most of our students on assistantship also receive $500 or more in scholarship assistance.

 

See the MFA Financial Aid page for up-to-date information. As you’ll see, our program matches up well with the 19 top programs listed in the print version of that Poets & Writers article.

 

This website has current information you may need as you consider applying to our MFA program.  Contact MFA Coordinator Martin Lammon if you have any questions. You can also learn more about our students and writing community: click here!

 

 

 

 

Martin Lammon is MFA Program Coordinator and teaches poetry and creative nonfiction

 

Renee Dodd, John Teschner (2010), Will Torrey (2011), Nathan Jackson Tucker (2010), Allen Gee, and Karen McElmurray at the Brick in downtown Milledgeville

 

The Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing program offers workshops with award-winning faculty writers in fiction, poetry, creative nonfiction and memoir, and scriptwriting, and students may write the thesis in any of these four genres. Unlike other MFA programs, we not only encourage students to work in other genres, we require our students to take one or two workshops in at least one genre other than their thesis genre. In addition, students take creative writing seminars in Poetry & Poetics or Prose Forms, Teaching Creative Writing, Theories of Composition and Literature, as well as noncreative writing classes in literature and other related courses.

 

Click here to see a sample program of study schedule. For the program’s degree requirements, see the GCSU Graduate Catalog. 

 

 

 

 

Arts & Letters

Journal of Contemporary Culture

 

Most students accepted to our program receive graduate assistantships.  Students on assistantship teach, work as consultants in the GCSU Writing Center, assist with the department’s journals: Arts & Letters and the Flannery O’Connor Review, and perform other professional duties. We are the only MFA program in the country that offers creative writing assistantships to “Peace Corps Fellows” who have returned from their volunteer assignments. In addition to assistantships, outstanding students may also apply for scholarships (most students on assistantship receive at least $500 in scholarship assistance) that will supplement their stipends. For more details about these opportunities, click here. 

 

 

 

Andalusia is the farm where O’Connor wrote most of her published fiction.

 

For photos of GCSU and Milledgeville,

Click here!

 

GCSU offers a unique setting for students interested in pursuing the MFA in Creative Writing.  Our university is small (about 6,000 students), located in historic downtown Milledgeville (home of Flannery O’Connor and former capital of Georgia from 1803-1868).  We’re located about 90 miles southeast of Atlanta, and within an easy drive (about three hours, more or less) to ocean beaches or the North Georgia mountains. Here, writers find an opportunity to write without the distractions one finds at a larger campus or in a big city.  Here, you’ll find a community of faculty and students committed to their writing, to their studies, and to each other. Here, you can visit Flannery O’Connor’s family farm, Andalusia, and if you’re interested we can even set up opportunities for you to have a quiet place there to work on your writing, in exchange for helping with the care and restoration of the farm.

 

 

Li-Young Lee meeting with MFA students at GCSU

 

 

 

 

Our students have published in journals such as Crazyhorse, Ploughshares, River City, and many more. Graduates have found teaching positions at St. John’s University, Penn State-The Behrend Campus, UNC-Chapel Hill, Tusculum College (TN) and many more!

 

Visiting Writers

 

Every year we sponsor a flourishing visiting writers series that brings in over ten writers every academic year.  This year, Scott Russell Sanders, ZZ Packer, and others will be coming to our campus to visit workshops and give readings. 

 

For a calendar of our visiting writers, click here.

 

Involved Students

 

Our students also attend the annual AWP national conference (Chicago in 2004, Vancouver in 2005, Austin in 2006) and publish their award-winning writing in journals across the country. In the spring of 2007, GCSU was a major sponsor of the AWP conference in Atlanta and also the AWP 2009 conference in Chicago. Our students also receive free copies of all issues of the AWP Writer’s Chronicle and Poets & Writers.

 

Learn more about our students, where they’ve published, and what they’re doing after they graduate.

 

You can even contact our current students to ask them questions via our program’s email at mfa@gcsu.edu.  If you’d like to apply, click here for information.

 

 

The Association of Writers

and Writing Programs

 

One of only 20 member colleges nationwide

 

 

Creative Writing Program

Campus Box 44

Georgia College & State University

Milledgeville, GA  31061

 

English Office: (478) 445-4581

MFA Office: (478) 445-3509