Michelle Zeller

The OP asked for practical advice what to ask MFA programs. She wanted to know what to ask to help herself. The moderator’s answer was “Don’t ask questions to help yourself. Ask questions to help the disabled.” And then what posts came next? Two people who post all day there felt they were outdone and had to post simply to say that they are even more politically correct than the moderator: “Great point! Thanks for bringin it up. These are great questions.” (She means great disability questions that the non-disabled should ask. It is like Starbuck420 says, a LinkedIn site.

Oh, but you did bad mouth them, and it sounds like that place sucks. If I wanted to watch every word I said like my career depended on it, I would get a job not an MFA. I scrolled through the Draft. Everyone is competing with each other for who can be more politically correct. Someone asked what you should ask MFA schools. She wanted practical advice. The moderator is basically retarded and said everyone has to ask about disability access. It is not that the moderator herself is disabled, but rather "If only disabled people ask about accessibility, it’ll get thought about every five years or something. And that’s not cool."

I read this fast, and I thought he got into an MFA.

I'm just angry at Michener because I know the odds, I wish I never applied there, I wasted my money, and to add insult to injury I had to pay for an official transcript. I'm probably too late, and maybe they won't even read my application. People should be angry. They think it is normal that all this human work be wasted. Thousands of people have to check portals every day, begging to get into some school. If you live in another country, Uni would be free, just like high school. so why isn't it free here? So the rich can get Trump's tax break? No, if it were free, you would not get a million applications. People know there is no money in an MFA degree. They won't put in the work just because it is free. If Bernie Sanders was elected, everything would have been free. Joe Biden plans to at least forgive some student debt, so some people who paid last year will at least get some money back. The schools should have given me a warning that they accept 1%. Some people apply without knowing. I thought ydrl's pic was of a faceless monster. It doesn't look like a chicken.

Michener's website gave me warning after warning that if I submit a unofficial transcript now, it will severely delay my application. I think initial transcripts can be unofficial, but if they make you resubmit, it has to be official. I did not attack a religion. I attacked the statement "you'll make it into tons of the programs you applied to." I think it is wrong to tell a religious person that they are factually correct on a non-religious issue based upon an assumption that disagreement will be interpreted as a religious attack.

I disagree. In England, all university is free. Bernie Sanders wants to make it free here. Actually, in most of the world is free. On this issue, you side with the Republicans, but I cannot do so myself. I don't disagree with your right to vote Republican, though.

I hate to be a Debbie Downer, but I am so pissed at Michener for making me spend an hour on a transcript and paying for the transcript when every other school allows an unofficial transcript. So I have to add that I don't believe in Jesus, but I do believe the irrationality of religion is a great topic for fiction. He won't get into "tons of the programs you applied to." You sound like me a few weeks ago when I didn't know anything about MFAs. I now have heard from everyone that no one gets in to a ton of programs. I do hate to be a Debbie Downer, but blame Michener. I have wasted money on 15 applications thinking I had a good chance everywhere and not knowing the acceptance rates.

Michener is one of the bullshit schools that demands an official transcript. If every school did that, I would go bankrupt. And there is no need, no advantage to demanding one before getting in. I've promised myself no check portals to February 15th, and then no more than once a day. I've fallen into a kind of I-don't-give-a-shit mode. If I go anywhere but Iowa, I will think that I could have waited till my writing got better and gotten in there. But Michener does give an extra year and no teaching. I've learned that recently. So that might be ok too. I'm starting to think I might decline even Michigan.

But you will read here or at the Draft what schools are in. And not very many results will come before mid-February. People here would be so better off if they could just forget their applications for a month. I've managed to. I haven't checked one portal yet. Michener sent me an email that I need a more recent college transcript. I had to spend an hour taking care of that, and now I'm all pissy.

It makes no sense for people to waste all day checking for results that won't be in for a month at least. I shall check nothing until March.

Can you post something you wrote? I first figured I would be accepted to all 15 schools I applied to. But then I read here that most applications are rejected. Now, I have no idea if my writing is so bad that it stands no chance at Michener. I want to see something you wrote to try to get some sense whether my writing is in that league. Also, is there any website to see past writing samples accepted?

That professor is full of shit. I've never heard anything dumber. Even I, whose MFA knowledge comes from five google searches, have already stumbled upon four claims that the SOP is thrown out. So Iowa sits there and says everyone can win a Nobel if they keep trying, and I don't care how close the applicant is to the Nobel today. I care about how he works with others. They check to see if the SOP sounds like the Unabomber. That's it. No one ever got in because of an SOP. They were only rejected for it. Everyone can't win a Nobel, and the level you start at matters. The professor is telling you how he wishes the world was, not how it is.

So I've been a fool all along taking comfort that applying to so many places meant I'll have places to pick between? So my future is you, getting wait listed at best, applying next year, and looking back at how foolish I was to have thought my writing sample was good the first year? I wasn't a Creative Writing major, so I don't really have a faculty to talk to. Why do people go to Columbia? Is Columbia easy to get into because they charge? Is Columbia easier to get into than all the 80 funded MFA's? How many of the 80 funded MFAs are easier to get into than Columbia. I don't understand why most of these google searches put Columbia in the top 10.

You're telling me that most people apply to a lot of places and don't even get in anywhere? So why the hell did I spend a fortune applying to 15 schools, if most people get rejected everywhere. I figured I was spending my money so I'd have the luxury to pic between places. I figured you needed to be accepted to many places, so you can show one school how much aid another school gave and negotiate. I know a lot of people who did that with undergraduate admissions. And now you are telling me that most people don't get in anywhere. What am I supposed to do next year if no one takes me? Why is it so hard to get in a school that basically offers no economic opportunity at graduation? I just read somewhere that Columbia offers very little aid. How do people there pay back student loans?

How much is the stipend at Iowa and Maryland? Why can't you just sign up for income based Obamacare? I don't understand. You recommend I do online searches for writings from faculty members at 15 schools? That would take months. I think you would have read a lot of pages from each author to decide whether you liked them. I don't know how much writing from each faculty member is even online. Which schools did you apply to last year, and which ones accepted you before you decided their stipend was too low?

I don't know where to go, and I applied to 15 schools, so I will probably have a lot to pick from. Everything else being equal, I figured high rank is better than low rank. So how do I know if say Maryland, a school I never heard of, is better for me than Iowa? Why is Maryland better than Iowa for you, despite not being on the top 10 lists? It says above you wanted the two high ranked schools Iowa and Austin. Why did you dump Austin for Vanderbilt? I've never seen Vanderbilt on a top ten list. I actually never heard of it, but I only know schools that google searches told me were top 10 by someone's ranking.

Why Minnesota and Maryland? They didn't come up on top in any of the google searches I did to try to find the highest ranked schools. Why Vanderbilt? It didn't come up on top in any of the google searches I did to try to find the highest ranked schools.

There are girls who made fun of me as an undergrad for reading Dannielle Steele. They said they were more sophisticated. They said I write like a farm girl and have no vocabulary. I don’t want the same reputation in mfa school. It would not have even occurred to me to write something different than "She thought he wasn't the type." How do I learn to write the fancy way Spacedumpster does, the way FairleyAlfy prefers. "To her mind, I know I am a vision of the antithesis of this scenario." It might take me a few years to build a vocabulary of fancy words. I had to look up these words for the story. Ravine, antithesis, fractal, incarnate, laminate, cheapjack, gradients (definition didn’t seem to fit), plasticine (not in dictionary) manacled. I’ll never sound sophisticated till I learn more big words and fancy ways to use them.

Can someone tell me more about flash fiction? I don't understand why they would want stories so short. Don't you need more space for stuff to happen? How can you reduce a 500 page novel to just 1000 words? Do they first write a whole novel and then shrink it? Also, spacedumpster, can you explain. Danielle Steele's 1000 page novels say things like "She thought he wasn't the type." Why do flash fiction writers change this to "To her mind, I know I am a vision of the antithesis of this scenario." I wonder what other types of writing I haven't found yet.

That reminds me of one of my favorite Danielle Steele quotes. “He fluctuated between delusions of grandeur and suspicions of worthlessness, while the rest of man hung out in the middle.” She is by far my favorite author.

Also, spacedumpster, can you explain what this means "To her mind, I know I am a vision of the antithesis of this scenario." I am used to easier and less sophisticated kind of stories.

I don't understand. How can a story be just one page?

This was such a great start to your story. I've never read anything like it. It is so different from my favorite authors. Can you post the second page too?

That sounds so great. Can you post what was accepted? I've never submitted a story to a journal. I didn't even know people do that. How much do that ones that pay give you?

What a coincidence. I applied to Brown too. I also applied to Michener and Michigan. When I did my google search for top programs, they all came up, so I picked them. I figured that I could decide later which one to go to. Which of your five schools do you want to go to if they all take you in? I am a first time applicant too.