The UNO Creative Writing Workshop is an interdisciplinary graduate program in fiction writing, nonfiction writing, poetry writing, play writing and screen writing. Its curriculum requires forty-five credits of graduate work, culminating in a creative thesis and leading to the MFA degree.

The Creative Writing Workshop's distinguished faculty comes from the English Department as well as the Department of Film, Theatre and Communication Arts. Representing over twenty-five states and three countries, our students hail from a wide variety of graduate and undergraduate institutions. While some come directly from undergraduate programs, many find their way to the CWW at other stages of their lives. The wide range of their experiences, both personal and professional, add to the cultural diversity of the program. And this eclectic mix, combined with New Orleans' long tradition of embracing the arts, makes for workshops that are lively and constructive, and which produce impressive creative work.

Alumnus and writer-in-residence Joseph Boyden's second novel, Through Black Spruce, won the Giller Prize, Canada's highest literary honor.

Alumna and writer-in-residence Amanda Buege-Boyden's second novel, Babylon Rolling, was released in 2008.

Every year, CWW students serve as first-round judges for the Tennessee Williams/New Orleans Literary Festival One-Act Play Contest. In exchange for this work, they receive free admission to all the festival's panels. Additionally, they may select a master class to attend, where they can study in a small group with fiction writers such as Richard Ford, Robert Olen Butler, Dorothy Allison and Michael Cunningham. Playwright Christopher Durang has taught a master class as has essayist/film maker Andrei Codrescu.Poets, such as Dana Goia, Donald Justice, Elton Glaser and Gerald Stern have read their work on campus, as have novelists Richard Ford, Bobbie Ann Mason, Robert Olen Butler and Dennis Williams.

In the CWW, the spirit is one of cooperation rather than competition. While many MFA programs have had to increase the number of students in their workshops in order to stay afloat, we are committed to keeping classes small. These small classes make it possible for our teachers to tailor their approaches to the particular needs of the individual. The program is a close-knit community in which students know their teachers and each other, read each other's work, and contribute to one another's growth as writers.

CWW students and alumni have a history of producing award-winning material. For example, CWW students have won the National Student Play Writing Award an unprecedented two times: Shirley Sergent for "Father's Prize Poland China" and Rebecca Basham for "Lot's Daughters." Both plays were performed at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C. To find out what kind of work our students and alumni are producing now, check out our CWW News page.

We offer admission only in the fall semester, and our deadline for applications is February 1st. To apply, simply follow the links on our Admissions page.

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