2026 Creative Writing MFA Applicants Forum

[strawberrymatcha]

3 minutes ago, Mimi202020 said:

Has anyone received a sexual misconduct form from UW? 

I did and it looks like other folks did as well, maybe they’re just starting to go over applications?

[BananaSlasher]

I got it as well. Where did you hear about those other folk?

[gm3]

9 minutes ago, BananaSlasher said:

I got it as well. Where did you hear about those other folk?

It's on the Facebook MFA draft group '26

[XXY]

1 hour ago, womanonline said:

SAIC does interviews as well. They sent an email this morning saying expect to hear about interviews in early February. 
 

Crossing my fingers for UMass since Nonfiction interviews haven’t hit the Draft yet… 

Fingers crossed for you!

Eesh, I'm getting all antsy and nervous for everyone here even though I probably won't be hearing from the schools I applied to for at least another few weeks. SENDING YOU ALL GOOD VIBES

[strawberrymatcha]

1 hour ago, jka0124 said:

Oooh oooh, I do. 

1) when you get the email, thank them and state whether you want to stay on the waitlist. 

2) You can also ask if the waitlist is ranked and if they’ve historically had movement. If you didn’t do that in your initial email, you can do that now. 

3) Check in again in three weeks to see if there’s been any movement and again every 2-3 weeks or so. They’ll let you know anyway, but showing interest (politely) is never bad. Just don’t email every other day or something. 

4) If you get in elsewhere and you know you won’t attend the place you’re waitlisted at, cut them loose. You’ll make someone’s day. 
 

5) Conversely, if you get into other places but your waitlist school is your top spot, it’s okay to email them and say “hey I have other offers but you’re still my boo thang.” Just. You know. More professionally than that. 
 

im currently very sick with covid but hopefully that all made sense. 
 

also! Don’t forget the big domino will happen in March. Once the bigger schools finalize their cohorts, other spots open up. Once I said yes to Vandy, I turned down seven other places which meant people got off those waitlists and so on and so forth. It’s a big ol’ landslide. 
 

happy waiting! 

thank you for all the advice, this is very helpful!! and I hope you feel better soon :”)

[meanwhile]

hi y'all, long time lurker but broke down and created an account bc the nerves are getting very real!! from what i've seen in this forum, many/most(?) of y'all seem to be fiction/non-fiction writers. was wondering if any other poets are here and if there seem to be, in general, a larger amount of applicants for those genres vs poetry? this year and other years too? i don't think my current anxiety levels could take joining the draft fb group, but i was wondering if (and i ask with all respect to the privacy of that space/understanding if this cannot be answered) it looks like an even-ish ratio of applicants from each genre? wishing everyone the best of luck ❤️ 

[impatientjoy]

I’m also a poet, & I’ve been wondering the same thing

[SolarFan]

RE That lone poetry Syracuse waitlist in Draft from the 22nd - I wonder if this means Syracuse poetry acceptances have already been sent? 

[analog_e]

47 minutes ago, meanwhile said:

hi y'all, long time lurker but broke down and created an account bc the nerves are getting very real!! from what i've seen in this forum, many/most(?) of y'all seem to be fiction/non-fiction writers. was wondering if any other poets are here and if there seem to be, in general, a larger amount of applicants for those genres vs poetry? this year and other years too? i don't think my current anxiety levels could take joining the draft fb group, but i was wondering if (and i ask with all respect to the privacy of that space/understanding if this cannot be answered) it looks like an even-ish ratio of applicants from each genre? wishing everyone the best of luck ❤️ 

 

45 minutes ago, impatientjoy said:

I’m also a poet, & I’ve been wondering the same thing

27 poetry responses vs 55 fiction and 8 nonfiction currently logged for 2026 (total between acceptances, waitlists, and rejections), and it looks like for 2025 poetry appears with half the frequency of fiction

[girlwiththegreenribbon]

i saw the nonfiction interviews posted on the spreadsheet for the university of arizona! (congrats btw <3) 

has anyone heard from them for fiction? 

[lisichka]

2 hours ago, meanwhile said:

hi y'all, long time lurker but broke down and created an account bc the nerves are getting very real!! from what i've seen in this forum, many/most(?) of y'all seem to be fiction/non-fiction writers. was wondering if any other poets are here

Poet here! 🤗

[lisichka]

Anyone else absolutely jonesing to hear from UMN? I just wanna know if I’ve been waitlisted or rejected 😩

[meanwhile]

1 hour ago, analog_e said:

 

27 poetry responses vs 55 fiction and 8 nonfiction currently logged for 2026 (total between acceptances, waitlists, and rejections), and it looks like for 2025 poetry appears with half the frequency of fiction

 

26 minutes ago, jka0124 said:

Fiction greatly outweighs the other genres. If a school has 500 MFA applicants, I’d wager as many as 350 are fiction, another 120 are poetry, and the rest are CNF *IF* the program even offers CNF. (Playwriting and screenwriting are often housed in the film or drama departments so I don’t have as many stats for those.)

What that means competitively depends on whether the genres take the same number of people. For my PhD, for example, there are probably only 50-60 CNF applicants compared to 200 for fiction. However, the program also only one CNF person versus 3-4 fiction. So it’s almost just as competitive. 

Hope that makes sense! 
 

(ETA: my degrees are all in fiction but I have more poetry publications lol. I should’ve just done poetry.) 

thank you both!! that does make sense!!

[meanwhile]

21 minutes ago, lisichka said:

Anyone else absolutely jonesing to hear from UMN? I just wanna know if I’ve been waitlisted or rejected 😩

same 😭 and now knowing that University of Arizona has sent out interview invites for nonfiction (even though i applied for poetry) has me on pins and needles. fingers crossed for us, lisichka 🤞

[womanonline]

Are the University of Arizona interviews for Tuscon?

[gm3]

16 hours ago, jka0124 said:

Oooh oooh, I do. 

1) when you get the email, thank them and state whether you want to stay on the waitlist. 

2) You can also ask if the waitlist is ranked and if they’ve historically had movement. If you didn’t do that in your initial email, you can do that now. 

3) Check in again in three weeks to see if there’s been any movement and again every 2-3 weeks or so. They’ll let you know anyway, but showing interest (politely) is never bad. Just don’t email every other day or something. 

4) If you get in elsewhere and you know you won’t attend the place you’re waitlisted at, cut them loose. You’ll make someone’s day. 
 

5) Conversely, if you get into other places but your waitlist school is your top spot, it’s okay to email them and say “hey I have other offers but you’re still my boo thang.” Just. You know. More professionally than that. 
 

im currently very sick with covid but hopefully that all made sense. 
 

also! Don’t forget the big domino will happen in March. Once the bigger schools finalize their cohorts, other spots open up. Once I said yes to Vandy, I turned down seven other places which meant people got off those waitlists and so on and so forth. It’s a big ol’ landslide. 
 

happy waiting! 

This is great to know. Congrats on getting into Vandy during another season -- can I ask which schools you had applied to? That's awesome that you got 7 acceptances and had options. What did you do to pass the time until the big domino in March? 

[prufrock_]

21 hours ago, strawberrymatcha said:

does anyone know what the best practices for waitlists are? I got waitlisted at UIUC earlier this month and sent them an email letting them know I was still interested, but now I’m starting to worry that I might’ve missed something else! (I could very well also just be going a bit stir crazy due to the pause before additional results come out…)

Grats! I was waitlisted last year for UIUC as well, so to give my experience: I sent a thanks, and then didn't hear anything back from them at all -- either that a spot opened or that they filled up (but i also never emailed them any further questions). 

[strawberrymatcha]

13 hours ago, lisichka said:

Anyone else absolutely jonesing to hear from UMN? I just wanna know if I’ve been waitlisted or rejected 😩

totally feel this too😭 it looks like last year they sent out waitlists the week after and rejections a month later lol

48 minutes ago, prufrock_ said:

Grats! I was waitlisted last year for UIUC as well, so to give my experience: I sent a thanks, and then didn't hear anything back from them at all -- either that a spot opened or that they filled up (but i also never emailed them any further questions). 

thank you for sharing and sorry that it didn’t pan out last year  that’s odd that they never let you know one way or another!

[gm3]

10 minutes ago, jka0124 said:

I can't remember where I applied at this point, but I'm pretty sure it was to 10. I cut loose Michener, USF (FL), NYU (20k stipend), NC State, U of Miami, and...aww crap, I can't remember who else I turned down. UVA? I didn't get into Johns Hopkins or Cornell, but by the time I got those rejections, I didn't even care lol.

I didn't apply to other big schools because I can't do snow (sorry, Michigan), I don't like the Midwest (sorry, Northwestern), and I'm a first-generation immigrant who gets really mad if I can't find plantains (sorry, every program in a tiny town). Vandy was my top choice, so once I got in, it was deuces to everyone else. Same thing for my PhD (I am at the University of Cincinnati). 

This was my second time attending an MFA, so I passed the time helping everyone else in Draft. Ultimately, this is my eleventh year helping MFA applicants, so it's my general pastime at this point. 

[Sorry for being long-winded. I'm bedridden right now and am bored out of my mind.]

ETA: I believe UMN won't be sending out waitlists until at least next week, btw. Minneapolis is going through a lot right now (the city, not the program... though, by extension, the program, too). 

I'm sorry you're bedridden! But that's awesome, you had that many acceptances. Thanks for the insight. What made you want to pursue a PhD after completing a manuscript at Vandy? Is your goal to be more so be a professor rather than a published author? I'd love to know about your journey with that, and if you also applied to numerous PhD programs and had a similar application season experience. 

[lizard in a blizzard]

Been seeing Syracuse poetry responses on the spreadsheet… ominous…. anyone heard from them for fiction so far?

[impatientjoy]

There’s a university of idaho playwriting acceptance posted. My idaho application says it’s not even with the department yet. Is it normal to send out acceptances before reviewing everyone?

[gafoo]

21 minutes ago, impatientjoy said:

There’s a university of idaho playwriting acceptance posted. My idaho application says it’s not even with the department yet. Is it normal to send out acceptances before reviewing everyone?

Playwriting is a totally different department, it's under the Theatre Arts MFA instead of the Creative Writing MFA. I wouldn't read much into that, as Idaho historically posts results starting in mid-to-late Feb

[meanwhile]

28 minutes ago, impatientjoy said:

There’s a university of idaho playwriting acceptance posted. My idaho application says it’s not even with the department yet. Is it normal to send out acceptances before reviewing everyone?

Mine is still awaiting initial review as well. I emailed the admissions department out of concern (U of South Carolina had issues with my transcripts, so I was wondering if it was the same issue) and they replied this morning saying everything is on track, they are still just taking longer than usual to process applications due to volume and the holidays. 

[BananaSlasher]

Can someone let me in the draft Facebook group? Thank you!

[Guest]

I shared the draft notification data outside the group… hhahahahaahahahaha