teasel

The only reason I said anything is because I published some poetry on my social media and didn't realize the repercussions until much later!! You should totally do whatever you want, I just wanted to make sure you knew it would count as "previously published." The lit mag world is full of weird rules that I'm still figuring out too
I use google docs personally with my writing group!  You can leave "notes" and suggestions in the margins and it can be accessed by multiple readers at the same time. It's also possible for you to make a separate, anonymous email if you're worried about privacy in an online group. I think that there are also FB workshop groups for MFA applicants but I understand if that's not a route you're interested in! 

See if you can find something here
https://www.awpwriter.org/community_calendar/writing_group_overview

Just follow your gut--sorry if that's "woo woo" or not what you want to hear, but if your heart is set on IWW and you're not feeling the offers you received, you have your answer. What is it about the four dream schools? Is it the "prestige"?  It's a totally legit reason! I just think it's worth examining why these other offers don't excite you in the same way. Either way, you should be very proud of yourself for your acceptances, especially during such a competitive year. If you are okay with waiting and are sure you wouldn't regret turning down the other programs, then there's nothing wrong in waiting as long as you know it's a gamble. Someone was waitlisted by IWW last year and rejected without a note this year, so it's kind of a crap shoot no matter what. Sorry if this isn't helpful! But I think it's okay to follow your heart, as corny as it sounds, as long as you're really taking a realistic personal inventory 

This is the way I'd look at this: With regard to the fully funded programs to which you've been accepted, the fact that you spent the time and money applying to them in the first place indicates that the programs have at least some attractive (to you) features. If you like the program, the faculty, the location, etc (I'm hoping you wouldn't have applied otherwise), and they're offering you adequate financial support, I'd say go for it. 

If you are referring to my post-which I think you are, explain please. I would think (and I am speculating you are right-but we all seem to be doing that on here) that a little life experience does bring something to the table. Not just age, but milestones, work, etc. I would hope that MFA programs would want a diverse group of writers to work with. I hope I end up in a program that supports diversity and a mentality that learning and writing is for a lifetime. How do they not care about experience? Please share. 
Many thanks, 
Cristie 

One thing that did come from the Iowa lawsuit discussed upthread is that we learned some demographic info about their app pool:
"The data provided to Thomson shows that, between 2013 and 2017, of the 5,061 fiction program applicants received by the workshop, only 135 were accepted. Three of the 287 applicants older than 41 were accepted. 
The workshop annually receives between 800 and 1,000 fiction applicants for the roughly 25 slots available, according to an email sent to Thomson by Steven Wehling, compliance coordinator for the UI Office of Equal Opportunity and Diversity. The median age for all applicants was 36, and the median age for accepted applicants was 34½."
That's just Iowa of course, but I'd bet it's a pretty close representation of the overall MFA landscape.

Since the two people I turn to for creative/professional advice are telling me opposite things, I wanted to ask the internet: 
If this was your first time applying and you got into more than one fully funded programs, waitlisted at more than one fully funded program, but rejected by your 4 "dream" schools (Cornell, Brown, Hunter, IWW) would you:
A ) be grateful and accept the best offer you got this year
B ) read these results as a sign to roll the dice and apply again next year believing there will be fewer apps and your manuscript will be better, and you'll get actually into one of your dream schools.

After getting an encouraging personal rejection from Iowa (fiction), I honestly feel torn about this.  I really admire the people who apply 2,3, or more times and DO end up exactly where they want. But this process has given me months of nontrivial anxiety - and so does the thought of going through it again when I don't have to (and ultimately could get in nowhere). I feel like there's a relevant aphorism out there that would tell me what to do, but I don't have a good memory for that kind of thing lol. 

@NLake @cecsav @teasel
May I interest you in my poetry coven meeting zoom meeting?

Waitlisted for poetry at UW Seattle!!!  They cut their incoming class by two thirds this year it seems... Anyway, hoping I get accepted from at least one of these waitlists. 
Condolences to those who've received rejections this week. I also received my Brown rejection, which was not surprising but still not a great way to start the day. I'm essentially just waiting on UVA (and Iowa snail mail) so I'm coasting until April at this point. In the meantime, I'm finally writing new material and sending things out to pubs again. Just trying to adapt as best I can!! Hope everyone is doing well--haven't been on here as much, but I'm wishing y'all the best. 
 

I'm guessing that calls went out and that we're waiting on snail mail for waitlists & rejections at this point, but this is really just speculation on my part. Apparently someone received an acceptance call in late March last year. I would tag the post/person, but it was from quite awhile ago! 

Waitlisted for poetry at UW Seattle!!!  They cut their incoming class by two thirds this year it seems... Anyway, hoping I get accepted from at least one of these waitlists. 
Condolences to those who've received rejections this week. I also received my Brown rejection, which was not surprising but still not a great way to start the day. I'm essentially just waiting on UVA (and Iowa snail mail) so I'm coasting until April at this point. In the meantime, I'm finally writing new material and sending things out to pubs again. Just trying to adapt as best I can!! Hope everyone is doing well--haven't been on here as much, but I'm wishing y'all the best. 
 

Waitlisted for poetry at UW Seattle!!!  They cut their incoming class by two thirds this year it seems... Anyway, hoping I get accepted from at least one of these waitlists. 
Condolences to those who've received rejections this week. I also received my Brown rejection, which was not surprising but still not a great way to start the day. I'm essentially just waiting on UVA (and Iowa snail mail) so I'm coasting until April at this point. In the meantime, I'm finally writing new material and sending things out to pubs again. Just trying to adapt as best I can!! Hope everyone is doing well--haven't been on here as much, but I'm wishing y'all the best. 
 

Yeah... you're not wrong. I went to Sarah Lawrence for part of my undergrad. Actually, I was there from 2010-2012, so maybe we know each other @dooooodle ! I definitely agree with a lot of what you mentioned... the conferences were probably the moments where I learned the most when it came to my writing. 
Anyway, if you can handle the trust fund kiddos playing thrift store dress-up and condescending to you about the bourgeoisie (that they're soooo clearly not a part of), then maybe your experience will be different. I feel like those of us on significant scholarship and financial aid found each other pretty quickly. Most of us transferred or dropped out all together. 
That being said, the faculty and classes were amazing. I was never more depressed than when I had to leave, but it was probably one of the smartest decisions I ever made, financially speaking. I guess you could say it was a very rude awakening to the realities of the world. I think that now that I'm older, I probably would have had an easier time. But such is life!  If you can financially swing it, then I say go for it. 

Thanks for this. Agreed. This is my first time round and when I started researching this MFA process I read a lot of stuff about it, as did probably most people here. I recall some one saying "people get rejected who have published in top-tier lit mags or have book contracts with prestigious publishers." Of course, Adcoms may decide such accomplished writers may not get much out of an MFA, but it's impossible to know what they are looking for. I sense from this community a ton of intelligence, articulateness, passion for the transformative value of language, and I am sure any number of us could thrive in most programs. I know from personal experience, having been writing on and off for 8 yrs with some published success and a lot of rejection, it's hard to tell with whom your work will resonate. At the end of day, the rejections have been good for me because I've developed a rhino skin, which has helped me in this application process. But whatever happens (I am still waiting on most of my decisions), I know I have to keep writing. It's what I think about all the time, even when I'm not writing (which is not good sometimes for my job life). Writing is how I try to make "sense" of our precious existence; it's my therapy and, when the work comes together, I feel a rush like nothing else and I suspect most of us here feel the same. 

Waitlisted for poetry at UW Seattle!!!  They cut their incoming class by two thirds this year it seems... Anyway, hoping I get accepted from at least one of these waitlists. 
Condolences to those who've received rejections this week. I also received my Brown rejection, which was not surprising but still not a great way to start the day. I'm essentially just waiting on UVA (and Iowa snail mail) so I'm coasting until April at this point. In the meantime, I'm finally writing new material and sending things out to pubs again. Just trying to adapt as best I can!! Hope everyone is doing well--haven't been on here as much, but I'm wishing y'all the best. 
 

Waitlisted for poetry at UW Seattle!!!  They cut their incoming class by two thirds this year it seems... Anyway, hoping I get accepted from at least one of these waitlists. 
Condolences to those who've received rejections this week. I also received my Brown rejection, which was not surprising but still not a great way to start the day. I'm essentially just waiting on UVA (and Iowa snail mail) so I'm coasting until April at this point. In the meantime, I'm finally writing new material and sending things out to pubs again. Just trying to adapt as best I can!! Hope everyone is doing well--haven't been on here as much, but I'm wishing y'all the best. 
 

I'm guessing that calls went out and that we're waiting on snail mail for waitlists & rejections at this point, but this is really just speculation on my part. Apparently someone received an acceptance call in late March last year. I would tag the post/person, but it was from quite awhile ago! 

I personally love that my inbox filtered my Brown rejection into the spam folder, as if to say, "Well we don't need any of that nonsense. Off with you!"

We get use to hearing "no," it's part of the writer thing, getting a "yes" feels surreal. I'm right there with you. I got an email from SLC about an upcoming event for accepted applicants today and squealed like a piggy. No matter what any of your other schools say, you got one, that's all that matters. Dance and go crush that job interview!

Thank you SO kindly for your words of affirmation and validation. ❤️  It's been a really hard year for so many of us and being jobless for the last year has taken a huge toll on me and my already suffering mental health; so many walls I now have up to protect my tender lil heart that I feel like I don't even know how to react in the moment to anything anymore. Thank you for the reminder of my vulnerability and irreducible particularities. I have another job interview in four hours but I'm going to dance around my apartment until then!  

I'm guessing that calls went out and that we're waiting on snail mail for waitlists & rejections at this point, but this is really just speculation on my part. Apparently someone received an acceptance call in late March last year. I would tag the post/person, but it was from quite awhile ago! 

Waitlisted for poetry at UW Seattle!!!  They cut their incoming class by two thirds this year it seems... Anyway, hoping I get accepted from at least one of these waitlists. 
Condolences to those who've received rejections this week. I also received my Brown rejection, which was not surprising but still not a great way to start the day. I'm essentially just waiting on UVA (and Iowa snail mail) so I'm coasting until April at this point. In the meantime, I'm finally writing new material and sending things out to pubs again. Just trying to adapt as best I can!! Hope everyone is doing well--haven't been on here as much, but I'm wishing y'all the best. 
 

Waitlisted for poetry at UW Seattle!!!  They cut their incoming class by two thirds this year it seems... Anyway, hoping I get accepted from at least one of these waitlists. 
Condolences to those who've received rejections this week. I also received my Brown rejection, which was not surprising but still not a great way to start the day. I'm essentially just waiting on UVA (and Iowa snail mail) so I'm coasting until April at this point. In the meantime, I'm finally writing new material and sending things out to pubs again. Just trying to adapt as best I can!! Hope everyone is doing well--haven't been on here as much, but I'm wishing y'all the best. 
 

Waitlisted for poetry at UW Seattle!!!  They cut their incoming class by two thirds this year it seems... Anyway, hoping I get accepted from at least one of these waitlists. 
Condolences to those who've received rejections this week. I also received my Brown rejection, which was not surprising but still not a great way to start the day. I'm essentially just waiting on UVA (and Iowa snail mail) so I'm coasting until April at this point. In the meantime, I'm finally writing new material and sending things out to pubs again. Just trying to adapt as best I can!! Hope everyone is doing well--haven't been on here as much, but I'm wishing y'all the best. 
 

Waitlisted for poetry at UW Seattle!!!  They cut their incoming class by two thirds this year it seems... Anyway, hoping I get accepted from at least one of these waitlists. 
Condolences to those who've received rejections this week. I also received my Brown rejection, which was not surprising but still not a great way to start the day. I'm essentially just waiting on UVA (and Iowa snail mail) so I'm coasting until April at this point. In the meantime, I'm finally writing new material and sending things out to pubs again. Just trying to adapt as best I can!! Hope everyone is doing well--haven't been on here as much, but I'm wishing y'all the best.