Old Dominion University - MFA Creative Writing Posted on April 27th
Though our creative writing program has been around for a long time, our MFA program is young and growing fast. Beginning in 1994, it started with 12 students and three creative writers. Now the range is 25-35 students each semester in fiction, poetry, and nonfiction. We have a 6-member creative-writing faculty.
The MFA Program is part of the English Department at ODU. In addition to taking workshops and craft courses with the MFA faculty, our students take courses with a dynamic faculty who have expertise in American, British, and world literature, as well as literary theory, film studies, and rhetoric. In our 54-hour program, students graduate not only as writers but also as individuals competent in literary studies.
Already, our students have accomplished a great deal–non fiction and fiction books with major publishers, stories and poems appearing in national magazines, prestigious grants and awards, and articles and reviews written for major newspapers. The MFA faculty –Michael Blumenthal, Luisa Carino Igloria, Michael Pearson, Janet Peery, Sheri Reynolds, and Tim Seibles–have published many highly acclaimed books. But as important as their writing talents is their teaching talent. Each of our writers is a skilled and caring instructor. All of them work closely with the MFA students–whether it be on the larger issues of craft or the particularities of a creative thesis project.
The MFA Program at Old Dominion University has much to offer. Hampton Roads is a vibrant community, with the ocean and bay, country and cityscapes, bookstores and bistros. Like the university, the MFA Program provides interested students with internship experiences. In particular, our Writers-in-Community Program gives creative-writing graduate students the opportunity to facilitate writing workshops in schools, hospitals, homeless shelters, housing projects, and retirement homes.
MFA students may also participate in the MFA Reading Series at Prince Books in downtown Norfolk. Likewise, they can assist with ODU’s internationally recognized annual literary festival and present papers or give readings at the spring conference sponsored by the English Graduate Student Organization. ODU’s Writer-in-Residency Program (offered in both the fall and spring semesters) allows MFA students to work one-on-one with respected poets and writers from around the country.
If ODU’s MFA Program sounds good (and it is), we invite you to be a part of it. Please feel free to call Sheri Reynolds (Graduate Program Director) at 1-757-683-4770.
