UNM’s MFA Program in Creative Writing is designed for graduate students committed to pursuing the writing life. This three-year degree combines studio-based workshops in fiction, poetry, and creative nonfiction with craft seminars and coursework in literature, pedagogy, and professional writing.

The MFA faculty is committed to supporting its graduate students with teaching assistantships for the full three years it takes most students to complete the program, offering them the opportunity to teach not only Freshman Composition and Expository Writing but Introduction to Creative Writing as well. UNM believes that MFA students should not go wildly into debt while completing their degrees. For this reason, all applicants to the program are encouraged to apply for teaching assistantships. The program is small by national standards, but with a relatively small student-faculty ratio and competitive teaching stipends for three years, UNM believes it offers MFA students the chance to fully immerse themselves in writing without the exorbitant price tags attached to some other MFA programs.