Gander

Hey everyone, Congrats all around on the A's and W's, so happy for those reaching towards their dream. I'm at 9 R's. I'd consider Pitt, NC State, Iowa, and U of Arizona soft rejections. As far as I know, at least, that leaves possibility for UVA, Brown, UNCG, USC, UFL, and NMU. I'd consider my best shot to be NMU, but who really knows. I've already started gathering info for next year's possibilities, and thinking about the ways I could improve, just in case. I'm looking into more speculative fiction-leaning ones that I should've switched out for some goliath, more literary ones this year. Also, just as a quick note, I saw someone mention WVU. I've lived near WVU for most of my life; I don't know anything about their program, but it seems great. Morgantown is a nice, lively, country-esque, pretty big (big by my standards, lol) college town with a lot to do. WVU has a bit of a reputation as a wild party school, but some of that's faded over the years, and I'm sure the program has no stock in that lol. I've known lots of very intelligent, awesome people, including close family members, to go to WVU and thrive.

If this helps at all, I already got rejected from Kansas. I'm not sure if they go in waves or what, but take that as you will haha. I was interested in the spec fic side of it, but evidently that didn't go too well lol.

Sitting at 0A/0W/3 Soft/4R/12P now, with Michener Center out (although I applied to Screenwriting there, opposed to Fiction). It's not looking good, especially with what I believed to be my best fit in ASU as a Soft R, but I'm trying to keep my hopes up with the 12 remaining. Congrats to all receiving As/Ws/successes!

Update: I ran out of reactions already.

Saw that there actually was a ASU acceptance posted today. Congrats to them! I hope that's not the end for that, but, who knows at this point...

Take my word with a grain of salt, but I'd imagine unless absolutely horrible, your GPA means very little to the Grad Councils. I'd imagine they look at writing samples primarily, personal statements and essays and LORs secondarily, and GPA/academic record as a distant third. The only way I think they'd care about GPA is as a reflection of your ability to handle the rigor of an MFA, but I'd say the six-year Doctorate proves that you're super well off in academia. This is also only taking GPA at face value; I'm sure it matters even less if you were involved in interesting work, groups, internships, etc. Even a lot of non-art degrees put more value in your accomplishments and experiences than your GPA.

Oh my god, I might be an idiot. I searched up "Fall 2025" for ASU and read a notif from February 2024 that tagged itself Fall 2025 instead of '24; which isn't the most unbelievable thing, but still. Carry on folks. Thank God that MFAs don't admit on account of common sense (or...or reading ability?) OCD does stuff to you, man.

I saw it on the GradCafe results page. It doesn't specify fiction or poetry, I think. I'm actually not on Draft, haha. I hope I'm wrong, but I saw it and my heart dropped.

Stopping in to send support, and say that I saw an ASU waitlist on the result page; congrats to them, but damn, that sucks for me. That was a top choice of mine, and stings a lot, even more than JHU, considering I felt ASU was more "in reach." Guess that makes my top spec fic option left Syracuse. 0a/0w/4 soft rejections/2r/13p Best of luck everyone and continue to trudge through the writerly angst 🙂

First off, just got a KU denial. Oh well. 0a/0w/2r/2 soft rejections/15P. And, I'm a year out of undergrad (graduated in May 2024)! I'm 23. I feel your pain, but you already have a fantastic start with FSU's waitlist, so you should be extremely proud!

Hey everyone! Good luck to everyone this week and congrats on the acceptances/waitlists so far. I'm not gonna lie, I'm very anxious, as I'm sure we all are; on top of all the usuals, I'm really, really hoping for an acceptance from ASU and/or Syracuse, as a spec fic writer. ASU in particular, I'm stalking my notifs for an unhealthy amount. I'm still sitting on just 1 hard rejection, and I'm considering IU and Pitt soft rejections. 0a/0w/1r/2 soft rejections/16p We're all in this together!

Same here. First response of the season 😞 Expected it, though. 0A/0W/1R/18P

Dude that's awesome! Congrats!

Wow, a FSU Fiction acceptance already? I'm not on Draft (I haven't used my Facebook since high school and have to reactivate my account), but that's a quick turn around, considering the app was due on the 15th. Congrats to that person, lol. Here's to hoping for a prosperous week for all!

Hi everyone, Lurker-turned-user here. I've applied to 18 different programs, 17 of which for Fiction (and 1 of which, Michener Center, for Screenwriting). I'm debating on a 19th, NCSU, due on Feb. 1st, because I mainly write speculative fiction and I've heard that one is quite good for it (but that was also when John Kessel was there). Speaking of which, some of my top choices are ASU and Syracuse, because of their support for spec fic, and the usual JHU/UVA/Indiana etc. Best of luck to everyone (and congrats to a few of the early A's and W's!) 0A/0W/0R/18P with a possible 19th