About Master’s Program,
The MFA Program in Writing welcomes brave and innovative writers and encourages the formation of mutually-supportive, inspiring literary communities. The program is small, with typically 4 to 8 new students admitted and funded each year. The intimate nature of the program allows students to work very closely with writing faculty and each other within the quarterly cross-genre workshop.
The MFA program is a three-year full-time, in-person program foregrounding the interconnectedness of literary arts practice, modes of production and distribution, and the rigorous study of literatures, arts, and cultures.
All graduate writing workshops are cross-genre and often interdisciplinary, investigating and often undermining a studio-versus-academic distinction in advanced literary education. Moreover, the program encourages interdisciplinary research and holistic approaches to teaching and learning. Therefore, teaching creative-critical reading and writing skills as a Teaching Assistant is a popular choice among all Writing students in the MFA program, most of whom are eligible for scholarships and fellowships in addition to union-represented compensation for Teaching Assistant work.
Program participants are encouraged to focus exclusively on writing, teaching, research, and art-making during their residency, allowing writers to integrate pedagogical training and artistic practice as a way to prepare for future scholarly endeavors while creating a book-length work of literature. To that end, each quarterly cross-genre workshop discusses writing-in-progress and published works in terms of poetics, prosody, and literary conventions alongside the interrelationship between aesthetic intervention/ experiment and radical social change across cultures, nations, regions, and movements.
While each writer’s extra-departmental coursework is flexible, program participants are expected to take five workshops. The cross-genre workshops function less as editorial sessions or as explications of craft techniques than as vibrant skill-sharing intellectual roundtables. UCSD’s writers generate dazzlingly diverse collaborations in writing and literary/arts events, many of which result in various forms of publication. Both faculty and graduate projects tend to repurpose, interweave, hack, and muddle generic categories and/or radically elasticize their conventions.
UC San Diego is a tier-one research university respected internationally for untangling mysteries and manifesting world-altering possibilities in the arts, humanities, and sciences. The MFA in Writing is part of the Department of Literature, a world literature department with a focus on critical theory, social justice, and cultural, ethnic, and gender studies, where faculty members work in multiple languages, geographies, and historical periods. All graduate writing workshops are offered in English, but program participants may work with Literature and extra-departmental faculty on bilingual or multilingual projects, including works in translation.
With ties to Visual Arts, Music, Ethnic Studies, Science Studies, the Clarion Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers’ Workshop and the Arthur C. Clarke Center for Human Imagination, along with other departments, centers, and programs, unprecedented entanglements of artistic and scholarly experimentation are encouraged. The MFA program co-exists with a thriving undergraduate writing major and benefits from the long-established New Writing Series and the Archive for New Poetry. Current MFA Writing Faculty include Kazim Ali, Amy Sara Carroll, Ben Doller, Camille Forbes, Lily Hoang, Jac Jemc, Casandra Lopez, Brandon Som, Anna Joy Springer, and Marco Wilkinson. Emeriti Writing Faculty include Rae Armantrout and Eileen Myles.
Master’s Program Degree Eligibility with GPA,
Applicants must hold a bachelor’s degree or the equivalent from an accredited institution in the United States or from a recognized university-level academic institution abroad by the time they enroll. Generally, applicants must have a minimum grade point average of B or 3.0 (or its equivalent, if the letter grade system is not used). Some exceptional applicants with lower GPAs may be recommended for admission. Refer to our application instructions for more information about grades.
International applicants must also demonstrate proficiency in the English language unless English is their native language or they studied full-time for one uninterrupted academic year at a university-level institution in which English is the language of instruction and in a country in which English is a dominant language. UC San Diego accepts the TOEFL, IELTS, and Pearson proficiency exams.
International applicants who are nonnative speakers must also have their language proficiency certified by UC San Diego if they will work as teaching assistants to fund their program.
The MFA Program doesn’t require the Graduate Record Exam. Please do not submit GRE scores.
Please refer to the Graduate Admissions website and our application instructions for more information.
Master’s Funding Coverage,
All applicants who are admitted to the MFA Program (in FA21 and beyond) will be guaranteed three years of financial support, including coverage of most of the tuition/fee costs. The support may come in the form of guaranteed TA positions on campus, other forms of campus employment, non-employment financial awards, or any combination of the three. The most common form of support is a 50% TA appointment on campus, and the current nine-month salary of a first-time TA with a 50% appointment is $29,125.00. As the actual financial support package for each admitted student may vary, applicants should refer to the financial support package letter that they receive upon being admitted.
Financial support (including employment as a TA, fellowship, and tuition payments) is contingent upon fulltime registration (12 units/quarter), satisfactory progress toward degree completion, campus time limits, and remaining in good academic standing.
As many financial support packages will include a guaranteed TA position for one or more years, please note the following policies regarding this guarantee:
- Students are responsible for submitting on-time and complete applications to as many open TA positions as possible (for which they are qualified). Students should absolutely apply to the College
- Students are responsible for accepting the first year-long 50% TA position offer they receive.
- International studentsmust meet the English language certification requirement for teaching assistants.
Above a beyond the salary/stipend amounts paid directly to the student, the financial support guarantee includes most of the tuition and fee costs charged to student each quarter. This includes the base tuition charge (currently $4,088 per quarter), the Student Services Fee (currently $402 per quarter), the Health Insurance premium (currently $1,470 per quarter), and most of the remaining campus fees (currently $355.12 per quarter). The fees that are left for the student to pay themselves is the one-time $100 document fee charged to newly admitted students and the UCGPC Systemwide Fee (currently $7 for the year, with students able to “opt out” if they wish).
Non-Residents will also be charged Nonresident Supplemental Tuition in the amount of $5,034 each quarter. Our department supports these students by paying this Nonresident Supplemental Tuition for their first year in the program (totaling approximately $15,102). Prior to the start of the second year, it is expected that these students will apply for California residency for tuition purposes. Once they have this residency status, they will not be charged Nonresident Supplemental Tuition. Should they choose not to file for residency, they will be required to pay the cost of the Nonresident Supplemental Tuition after the first year.
International students will also be charged Nonresident Supplemental Tuition in the amount of approximately $5,034 each quarter. Our department supports these students by paying this Nonresident Supplemental Tuition for their first three years of enrollment (or through the quarter of graduation, if that happens before the end of the third year). If international students choose to remain enrolled in the program beyond the third year, they will be required to pay the cost of the Nonresident Supplemental Tuition after the third year.
Application Requirement,
Literature Application Questions
Additional Information (Fellowship Application)
Application Deadline,
Dec 04, 2025
Application Fee,
US Citizens, Permanent Residents, and Undocumented Applicants: $135.00
International Applicants: $155.00
