Goucher College in Towson, Maryland, offers a Master of Fine Arts (MFA) in creative nonfiction. The program lasts four semesters; students complete two-week summer residencies, and a long weekend during the spring semesters. The program includes intense writing workshops, panel discussions and craft lectures. At the conclusion of the program, students have completed at least 200 pages of creative writing and served a 45-hour internship at a literary journal, publishing house, commercial magazine or with a published writer. Other schools on the East Coast offering graduate programs in creative writing include George Mason University in Virginia, Warren Wilson College in North Carolina and Georgia State University.
Portland State University in Portland, Oregon, offers a residency MFA in creative writing. Students choose from poetry, fiction and nonfiction specializations. The program offers writers a chance to explore their intellectual and creative abilities through writing, working closely with professional writers and networking with people in the publishing world. Antioch University's Los Angeles campus offers an MFA in creative writing, as does the California Institute of the Arts.
The MFA program in creative writing at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee includes workshops in poetry, fiction and non-fiction, as well as courses in African-American and non-African-American literature. Students are required to create a thesis of five short stories, a 150-page novel or 30 poems before graduating. Students also enjoy workshops and seminars featuring published writers and literary agents. Chicago State University in Illinois also offers an MFA in creative writing.
If students lack the time or means to attend a campus-based MFA program, there are a number of creative writing options offered online. The University of Texas at El Paso offers a 48-hour MFA in creative writing called Creative Writing the Americas. The program is bilingual. It claims to be as vigorous as other similar residency programs and requires demonstration of writing talent to enroll. Other online creative writing advanced degrees are offered by Antioch University and the University of Maryland-College Park.