2026 Creative Writing MFA Applicants Forum

[strawberrymatcha]

anyone else waiting for notre dame this week? based on last year’s sheet and the poetry interviews last week I’m thinking fiction might be coming up soon…

[goodoldneon]

1 hour ago, gafoo said:

Everyone on the waitlist got this email in early April:

"On behalf of the University of Minnesota’s MFA Program in Creative Writing, we would like to extend our appreciation for your application. Unfortunately, UMN’s College of Liberal Arts has suspended the waitlists for all programs for this admission year. As a result, you will receive an official rejection letter from the university soon. This circumstance is beyond our control and is not a reflection of the quality of your application or materials. Even as the MFA Program receives hundreds of applications each year and we select very few for admission and waitlisting, being required to suspend our waitlist is atypical. We wish you the very best of luck in pursuit of graduate-level creative writing study."

I heard they still have budget issue this year. They already cut their class size. 

[impatientjoy]

5 minutes ago, lisichka said:

UMN (waitlist), NC State, and maybe UT Austin NWP (though that might come next week)! at least NC State acceptances never go into march so I can safely bet that there will be news this week

I’m also curious about nc state and umn waitlist!! Thought poetry notifications for nc state would happen last week

[insearchoflostwine]

10 minutes ago, Theodosia said:

My god, how I wish I could email Sam Chang and just ask if I got in! 

I began working on the first draft of my writing sample for the next application cycle today, but even that isn't helping my desperation to know if I will be waitlisted or get a tier rejection. I've been fantasizing about a note at the bottom of my rejection, as rare as that is, and I will be truly devastated if after all this self-imposed mayhem, I receive the formiest of form rejections. 🤣

Ugh same! What I wouldn't give at this point for a barely legible scrawl from her at the bottom of a rejection that just said something like, This has real potential. Keep going! 

[meanwhile]

Hoping to hear something for poetry at University of Arizona and Idaho this week! If it's on the draft already, would someone kindly let me know? I feel like I'm that Bernie Sanders "I am once again asking" meme lol 

[vilum]

1 hour ago, ocurlyfries said:

Anybody know if fiction waitlists go out the same time poetry waitlists do for USF?

i was emailed about an hour ago! USF is one of my top choices so really hoping there's some movement there... 

[ocurlyfries]

4 minutes ago, vilum said:

i was emailed about an hour ago! USF is one of my top choices so really hoping there's some movement there... 

I emailed them about 30 minutes ago to check! Freaking out because it's my top choice lol

Edited February 23 by ocurlyfries
clarity

[Sumire11]

1 hour ago, Ogwick said:

Portuguesa? Tudo Bem?

my product is from Brazil that we are launching - spent a lot of time down there!

if “Sem” was a spelling mistake - never mind!  Ha

Internet shorthand lmao. I'm all the way over in south asia

Edited February 23 by Sumire11

[Ogwick]

Pro-tip warning:

if you are anxiously waiting by your cell phone like a bad prom date, do NOT update your iOS software like I just did.

This update took way way longer than normal, designed by the engineers at Apple to mentally torture us all, specifically on this “last hours of Iowa Monday” day. 
 

Public Service Announcement over. 

Edited February 23 by Ogwick

[Ogwick]

13 minutes ago, Sumire11 said:

Internet shorthand lmao. I'm all the way over in south asia

I love it. My thesis is all about how language and words lose their intended “true meaning” across worlds / cultures - ie the receivers (those with human eyes / ears) have no comprehension of the speakers background of what they are saying, even though it’s “clear” to them.

 

“Sem” in Brazil means “without” so you said (literally if we were in São Paulo) 

“…if it was a choice between my hair and getting into Iowa, I’ll take without hair” in short hand internet txt 

You were using a different internet short hand entirely for “SEM” - but yet a similar enough meaning for the message to be received completely differently on my end. 
 

(In Spock voice) “Fascinating…”

Edited February 23 by Ogwick

[Sumire11]

1 minute ago, Ogwick said:

I love it. My thesis is all about how language and words lose their intended “true meaning” across worlds / cultures - ie the receivers (those with human eyes / ears) have no comprehension of the speakers background of what they are saying, even though it’s “clear” to them.

 

“Sem” in Brazil means “without” so you said (literally if we were in São Paulo) 

“…if it was a choice between my hair and getting into Iowa, I’ll take without hair” in short hand internet txt 

You were using a different internet short hand entirely for “SEM” - but yet a similar enough meaning for the message to be received completely differently on my end. 
 

(Spock voice) “Fascinating…”

It'd be interesting working with you man. The novel I'm working on also dives deep into labels in the forms of names. 

 

Aside from iowa, any other school you holding out on/have anything from?

[XXY]

Heyo @gafoo, just wanted to shout you out bc I saw your acceptance in Draft. Congratulations!!

[Sumire11]

Congrats @gafoo. Share some of that kickass manifestation with the rest of us!

But if I had a fully-fledged wish like that, what do you guys think, would it be better manifesting a perfect world where we have no desires and all our basic needs are met and we are eternally content or an iowa acceptance? 

Decisions, decisions...

Edited February 23 by Sumire11

[Ogwick]

18 minutes ago, Sumire11 said:

It'd be interesting working with you man. The novel I'm working on also dives deep into labels in the forms of names. 

 

Aside from iowa, any other school you holding out on/have anything from?

Nope!  I’m the ugly duckling black swan this year. 

I went to Northwestern but spent my existence on North Campus - think 3D calculus and organic chemistry - not on the fun South Campus with all the fun theater and MFA types… (no complaints / I had a lot of fun at college!)

Anyway - I’ve been a corporate guy then entrepreneur.  I got a big / idea for a project and (surprisingly to me) had someone on the phone from “Hollywood” on this project idea of mine (multi season streaming tentpole like franchise based on a best selling book / the author (I just called his agent) gave me their permission to pitch it based on my “idea” - won’t call it a script back then).

(I’m good at deals / getting people on the phone - I was just amazed I had gotten this far!)

Also was clear to me I had absolutely no fucking idea what I was doing. Last English class I took was in high school (self taught reader). 
 

ANYWAY - the point being it was clear to me that if I was going to “try this creative arts thing” I needed to know what the heck a “character write up pitch was” and how a good one would be judged. 
 

(me on the phone with CAA rep -“sure - not a problem - char write up.  Easy easy”.   Click. What the fuck is that?!)

 

So I applied only to Iowa and wrote a lot in a very short compressed time period. I operate best under pressure and unrealistic deadlines. 
 

So in the end I never had a chance of hell of getting into Iowa, but this is how I force myself to learn something new for a goal / reason 

if I don’t get into Iowa - that tells me I just saved myself 2 years to get moving on this!

I have no problem sharing my final “output” here if you want to read it. I don’t really mind “doxxing myself” with my work - isn’t that the point of all this?! I get confused why authors would want to be anonymous?!)

Edited February 23 by Ogwick

[impatientjoy]

It looks like Montana does do rolling acceptances! Still only CNF though!

[greenleaf]

1 hour ago, meanwhile said:

Hoping to hear something for poetry at University of Arizona and Idaho this week! If it's on the draft already, would someone kindly let me know? I feel like I'm that Bernie Sanders "I am once again asking" meme lol 

Am also waiting for Arizona poetry! Draft only has nonfiction entries for Arizona, no fiction or poetry. An Idaho fiction acceptance went out on 2/16 and a playwrighting interview on 1/26, also nothing for poetry.

[Sumire11]

I'd love to read your work. It's ramadan here, and the iowa thing has pretty much sapped me of all energy. But I'll get to it by this week if you want. I'm not sure how you can send it to me though? 

Also, I'm a business grad as well, so I'm pretty much on the same boat, a duckling that wants to fly and all that. I don't remember how Quacker ended up flying in Tom and Jerry, but I could sure use his methods now. 

Edited February 23 by Sumire11

[Ogwick]

4 minutes ago, Sumire11 said:

Congrats @gafoo. Share some of that kickass manifestation with the rest of us!

But if I had a fully-fledged wish like that, what do you guys think, would it be better manifesting a perfect world where we have no desires and all our basic needs are met and we are eternally content or an iowa acceptance? 

Decisions, decisions...

Did @gafoo get into Iowa or a different school?  Since I only applied to Iowa I don’t bother looking at the spreadsheet 

congrats regardless!  That’s great 

[SocialKonstruct]

7 minutes ago, Sumire11 said:

I'd love to read your work. It's ramadan here, and the iowa thing has pretty much sapped me of all energy. But I'll get to it by this week if you want. I'm not sure how you can send it to me though? 

Also, I'm a business grad as well, so I'm pretty much on the same boat, a duckling that wants to fly and all that. I don't remember how Quacker ended up flying in Tom and Jerry, but I could sure use his methods now. 

Nice I am also Muslim too…

[meanwhile]

15 minutes ago, greenleaf said:

Am also waiting for Arizona poetry! Draft only has nonfiction entries for Arizona, no fiction or poetry. An Idaho fiction acceptance went out on 2/16 and a playwrighting interview on 1/26, also nothing for poetry.

Thanks greenleaf!! Here’s to hoping we’ll be shaking hands in Tucson this fall 🤞

[whitneyyyy]

6 hours ago, SocialKonstruct said:

Indeed, the Chinese publishing industry is pretty different than that of the US. Damn, even the French and UK publishing industries are too. The American publishing industry has pretty much been mostly about who you know and where you been rather than literary quality in so many cases. Also Mo Yan probably doesn't need a degree as he is state sanctioned by China  until recently. https://kenyonreview.org/kr-online-issue/2012-fall/selections/anna-sun-656342/ Plus if he were here in the US, I doubt that his brilliant prose would have seen the light of day.

In fact, we aren't really even getting today's American writers who are critical of the regime in an explicit way. Perhaps American censorship is much worse than we thought and even more forbidding than that of the Chinese government (I feel that we have less freedoms here than overboard tbh).

In France, I really love the fact that many of their brilliant writers didn't even get a MFA at all. Michel Houellebecq and Annie Ernaux didn't even have that fabled degree. Houellebecq went to the Institut National Agronomique Paris-Grignon whereas Ernaux went to her education to become a schoolteacher and never finished her literary degree.

Much of the blame can be placed on American literary agents in many cases. Granted, very rarely will you get a solid experimental novel from the slush pile but most American literary agents tend to look at the professional credentials of the person or get a referral rather than read the ACTUAL work itself.

A prime example of such a royal screw up was the disasterous publication history for Helen DeWitt's The Last Samurai which shows how bad the US publishing industry is. https://lithub.com/seven-ways-to-hand-sell-a-lost-modern-masterpiece/ and https://theadvocateblogdotnet.wordpress.com/2015/10/18/afterglow-the-last-book-textual-survival-and-apocalyptic-knowledge-in-helen-dewitts-the-last-samurai/. Thank God (or Allah) for New Directions Publishing for saving it from obliteration.

I should have been a lot more specific and mentioned that genre fiction usually doesn't require the degree but literary fiction usually does and there is way more gatekeeping in that area, tragically enough.

Because of what the Chinese government has done, I feel a deep hatred toward it. This is also one of the main reasons why I want to remain in the US. I genuinely believe that freedom of speech in the US is much stronger than in China. In China, when you publish literary works, you inevitably have to avoid discussing politics. Nothing negative is allowed at all. Even topics such as sexual orientation must be handled with caution. In 2018, the BL author Tianyi was sentenced to ten years in prison. She is about to be released, but more than fifty other authors have recently been arrested. This is the current state of Chinese literature. And given the level of corruption in the Chinese government, I believe that there are not a small number of people who get published through nepotism and connections.

Returning to the discussion about the MFA, I still believe that in countries with relatively free speech, whether one succeeds in publishing depends on whether the story is genuinely good and whether people are willing to buy it. I am a genre fiction writer, so applying for an MFA is becoming less and less necessary for me.

 

[Sumire11]

8 minutes ago, Ogwick said:

Did @gafoo get into Iowa or a different school?  Since I only applied to Iowa I don’t bother looking at the spreadsheet 

congrats regardless!  That’s great 

A different school. I shouldn’t share any more though, I feel like

@gafoo I'm sorry if even this went a bit far. 

4 minutes ago, SocialKonstruct said:

Nice I am also Muslim too…

Niceee

You having any issues with fasting during this time. I'm doing my best, but man, I'm so anxious and depleted that I actually thought I was having a heart attack this Saturday. 

[Ogwick]

25 minutes ago, Sumire11 said:

I'd love to read your work. It's ramadan here, and the iowa thing has pretty much sapped me of all energy. But I'll get to it by this week if you want. I'm not sure how you can send it to me though? 

Also, I'm a business grad as well, so I'm pretty much on the same boat, a duckling that wants to fly and all that. I don't remember how Quacker ended up flying in Tom and Jerry, but I could sure use his methods now. 

Ok entertain me because this is a game I like to play (I’ve traveled a lot).  Where are you…

South Asia - Muslim country or heavy population - highly educated, fluent English, heavy American media consumption to highlight Tom and Jerry cartoon that I even had to pause to remember and I watched TV non-stop as a kid in the Midwest…

 

My first guess was Jakarta - but the Tom and Jerry ref makes me say Singapore. 
 

How did I do!?

If I DONT get in - I’ll post a Dropbox link here you can copy and paste my Iowa thesis to Download it. 
 

This final output (not what I applied to Iowa with) is a 80’s Rock Opera Libretto (opera lyrics without the music score) 

Edited February 23 by Ogwick

[gafoo]

Thank you so so much @XXY and @Sumire11! (And @Ogwick it was U of Montana, not Iowa, lol). This is sorta my dream school lol so I'm reeling a bit. Still need to find out whether I got sufficient funding/TAship, which he said we would discuss in a phone call this week. But I'm taking a second to just be happy about the win regardless. 

Also—it seems like Chris is personally emailing, so I think we can definitely expect it's an in-progress slow rollout. 

Edited February 23 by gafoo

[womanonline]

Just now, gafoo said:

Thank you so so much @XXY and @Sumire11! (And @Ogwick it was U of Montana, not Iowa, lol). This is sorta my dream school lol so I'm reeling a bit. Still need to find out whether I got sufficient funding/TAship, which he said we would discuss in a phone call this week. But I'm taking a second to just be happy about the win regardless. 

Also—it seems like Chris Dombrowski is personally emailing, so I think we can definitely expect it's an in-progress slow rollout. 

Came here to congratulate you as well, I remember seeing that Montana was one of your top choices!!! Congratulations, celebrate that huge win today!!!