Low-Residency MFA Mountainview Master of Fine Arts Fiction or Nonfiction

Flexible

As a low-residency program, the only set class times you'll have are during your weeklong residencies. This gives you the opportunity the rest of the year to create a writing schedule that works for you.

Affordable

Take advantage of some of the lowest tuition rates in the nation, plus financial aid for those who qualify.

There are also a number of scholarships available just for students in the Mountainview MFA program.

Respected

Founded in 1932, Southern New Hampshire University is a private, nonprofit institution with over 100,000 graduates across the country. SNHU is regionally accredited by the New England Commission of Higher Education (NECHE), which advocates for institutional improvement and public assurance of quality.

Opportunities

Our opportunities to join the ranks of fellow writers include:

• History of students finding agents and editors through our residencies and faculty.
• Being published in Assignment, the MFA program's own literary magazine.

SNHU requires an undergraduate grade point average (GPA) of 2.75 (or equivalent) for admission.

Acceptance decisions are made twice a year for our two graduate terms:

• Application deadline for January cohort: Oct. 30
• Application deadline for June cohort: April 30

Here's what we need prospective students to submit:

1. The Mountainview MFA application.
2. An official transcript from the college or university that conferred your bachelor's degree. Send transcripts to mfa@snhu.edu.
3. An 800- to 1,000-word personal statement describing your writing experience and the nature of your commitment to writing. Include your assessment of why you're a good candidate for the program. We're always interested in learning about a candidate's academic, personal and professional experiences.
4. A 20- to 30-page, double-spaced writing sample, using 12-point font, in fiction or nonfiction. Your writing sample may consist of a novel excerpt, a story or multiple stories, if fiction – or a memoir excerpt, a creative essay or multiple creative essays, if nonfiction.
5. Two letters of recommendation from people capable of assessing your ability to work independently and your preparation to succeed in an MFA program.
6. All documents should be sent to mfa@snhu.edu.

Residencies are weeklong, twice-yearly periods of intense study, in which all students and faculty gather at the Mountain View Grand Resort in the White Mountains of New Hampshire.

The summer residency takes place in June, with the winter residency held in January. Students arrive on a Sunday and leave the following Sunday for all 4 of their residencies. The daily schedule looks like this:

• Mornings: Students divide into small groups to discuss one another's writing. These groups are known as peer workshops. Each workshop is led by two faculty members.
• Early afternoons: After lunch, faculty give seminars on different points of craft, and then students attend talks and readings by visiting authors, editors and agents.
• Early evenings: Each student meets one on one with his or her faculty mentor to devise an individualized curriculum for the coming semester. Students give short readings before dinner.
• Nights: After dinner, the faculty read from new work. Many critically acclaimed novels and oft-anthologized stories and essays made their debuts at residency while works in progress.

The residencies are set at the picturesque Mountain View Grand Resort, which overlooks the Presidential Range and sits on 1,700 acres of pristine land.

Built in 1865, the resort has a rich literary, artistic and political history. Charles Dickens spent several days there during an American tour, performing scenes from his novels, gaslights overhead, stage backlit with a muffled screen, windows open to moonlight and mountain breezes.

Ralph Waldo Emerson, Robert Frost and Norman Rockwell turn up on old guest registers, as do Betty Grable, Bette Davis, the Marx brothers and presidents Grover Cleveland, Warren Harding, Calvin Coolidge, Franklin D. Roosevelt and Dwight Eisenhower.

And for years, lore had it that the resort was the inspiration for Stephen King's "The Shining." (That distinction belongs to the Stanley Hotel in Colorado, but the confusion is understandable.)

You'll find plenty of activities here. In the summer, there's golf, tennis, fishing and hiking – one path offers views of Scottish highland cattle grazing. And in the winter, there's ice-skating by day or night, and guests can travel the groomed trails on snowshoes or cross-country skis.

Other amenities include indoor and outdoor pools, a large gym and a 17-seat movie theater.

There is also a working farm, full of alpacas, goats, chickens and rabbits. The farm provides the hotel's eggs and vegetables, and it produces a distinctive Mountain View Farm Blend of wool and yarn.

Included in your residencies are breakfast and dinner buffets. You'll find plenty of inexpensive lunch options, as well.

Residency Dates

2022 Winter Residency: January 9 – January 16
Application Deadline: October 30, 2021

2022 Summer Residency: June 19 – June 26
Application Deadline: April 30, 2022

The Mountainview MFA program makes a number of scholarships available for its students. The program also awards other scholarships and fellowships at the director's discretion.

Mountain Scholarships ($2,000): Mountain Scholarships are awarded by the director to students whose writing samples show extraordinary literary merit. A Mountain Scholarship may be renewed semester by semester.

Residency Scholarships ($1,000): Residency Scholarships are applied toward the residency fee for the term. They are awarded by the director to students with superior writing samples. A Residency Scholarship may be renewed term by term.

Our full-time faculty members have won many awards. Learn more about the writers who work with our MFA students.

Benjamin Nugent

Director of Mountainview MFA, Associate Professor

Benjamin Nugent, director of the Low-Residency Mountainview MFA in Fiction and Nonfiction, is the author of the novel "Good Kids" (Scribner) and the cultural history "American Nerd" (Scribner). His short stories have appeared in The Paris Review, Tin House and Vice and been anthologized in "Best American Short Stories" and "The Unprofessionals: New American Writing from the Paris Review."

His journalism has appeared in The New York Times Magazine, The New York Times Op/Ed Page, Time, GQ, The Washington Post, The Atlantic and n+1.

He earned his bachelor's in English from Reed College, and he was an Arts Fellow at the Iowa Writers' Workshop, where he earned his MFA in fiction.

Rachel B. Glaser

Faculty

Rachel B. Glaser is the author of the story collection “Pee On Water,” the novel “Paulina & Fran” and the poetry books “Moods” and “Hairdo.”

In 2017, she was on Granta’s list of Best of Young American Novelists. Her fiction has been anthologized in “30 Under 30” and “New American Stories.”

She lives in Northampton, Massachusetts.

Amy Irvine

Faculty

Amy Irvine is a sixth-generation Utahan and longtime wilderness advocate, who for seven years worked for the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance.

Her work has appeared in Orion, Climbing, High Desert Journal and in numerous western, nature and environmental anthologies.

Irvine's first book, ''Making A Difference: Stories of how our Outdoor Industry and Individuals are Working to Preserve America’s Natural Places,'' was one of three books featured in the Washington Post for Earth Day, 2002. Her second book, ''Trespass: Living at the Edge of the Promised Land'' (Farrar, Straus & Giroux/ North Point Press), received the Orion Book Award and Colorado Book Award, while the Los Angeles Times wrote that it "might very well be ‘Desert Solitaire's’ literary heir."

In a starred review, Booklist characterized ''Trepass'' as "a penetrating critique of Mormon sovereignty" and called Irvine "bold and original in her thinking, candid and lyrical in expression," claiming that she "joins red-rock heroes Edward Abbey and Terry Tempest Williams in breaking ranks and speaking up for the living world." Her essay ''Spectral Light'' (Orion, January-February 2010 /The Best American Science and Nature Writing of 2011), was a finalist for the Pen Award in Journalism. Her third book, ''Terra Firma,'' is forthcoming from Counterpoint Press.

Irvine has taught nonfiction creative writing and memoir workshops throughout the West.

Jo Knowles

Faculty

Jo Knowles is an award-winning young adult and middle-grade novelist.

Her books include "Living with Jackie Chan," "See You At Harry's", "Pearl", "Jumping Off Swings", "Lessons from a Dead Girl" and, most recently, "Read Between The Lines."

Some of her awards include a New York Times Editor's Choice and Notable Book, an American Library Association Notable Book, an IndieBound Summer Top 10, Amazon's Best Middle Grades, an International Reading Association Favorite, New England Children's Booksellers Advisory Top Title, two SCBWI Crystal Kite Awards, Kirkus's Best Teen Books, the PEN New England Children's Book Discovery Award and YALSA's Best Fiction for Young Adults. Her books have appeared on numerous state book award lists for schools and libraries.

Jo grew up in Meredith, New Hampshire, and earned her undergraduate degree at Simmons College, where she majored in English with a concentration in writing. She went on to earn a master's degree in children's literature from Simmons College.

She now lives in Vermont with her family where she writes, leads writing workshops for teens and adults, and visits schools and libraries to talk about books and writing with students of all ages.

Nadia Owusu '17

Faculty

Nadia Owusu is a Brooklyn-based writer whose first book, “Aftershocks,” was published by Simon & Schuster in 2021. Her 2019 lyric essay chapbook, “So Devilish a Fire,” was a winner of The Atlas Review chapbook contest. She is the winner of a 2019 Whiting Award.

Her writing has appeared or is slated to be published in The New York Times, Lumina, Catapult, The Literary Review, Electric Literature, Bennington Review, Columbia Journal and The Rumpus, among other publications. She won second place in the 2017 Lumina nonfiction contest and received an honorable mention for the 2017 Gulf Coast Prize.

In addition to writing, she leads research and racial equity strategies at an economic racial justice organization. She earned her MFA in Nonfiction through SNHU’s Mountainview program, where she won the Robert J. Begeibing Prize for exceptional work. She previously earned her MS in Urban Affairs from CUNY Hunter College and her BA in Political Science from Pace University.

Lydia Peelle

Faculty

Lydia Peelle is the author of the short story collection "Reasons for and Advantages of Breathing," which was a New York Times Editors' Choice book and received an honorable mention for the 2010 PEN/Hemingway Award. Her debut novel, "The Midnight Cool," was published in 2017.

A 2009 National Book Foundation ''5 under 35'' honoree, a 2010 recipient of a Whiting Award and a recipient of the Anahid Literary Award for Armenian-American Writers, Peelle is a graduate of the MFA program at the University of Virginia and has received fellowships from the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, the Corporation of Yaddo, the Ragdale Foundation and the Ucross Foundation. Her work has appeared in publications including The New York Times Book Review, Granta, the Sun, Orion and has been awarded two Pushcart Prizes, an O. Henry Prize and twice been featured in Best New American Voices.

Rebecca Schiff

Faculty

Rebecca Schiff is the author of the story collection "The Bed Moved" (Knopf 2016), a finalist for an LA Times Book Award in First Fiction and a Sami Rohr Prize.

Her fiction has appeared in Electric Literature, n+1, The Guardian, Washington Square and BuzzFeed, and it was anthologized in The Best Small Fictions 2017.

She lives in Eugene, Oregon.

Katherine Towler

Faculty

Katherine Towler is author of a trilogy of novels: ''Snow Island,'' ''Evening Ferry'' and ''Island Light.’’ Praised by the Boston Globe as "luminous and moving,'' ''Snow Island'' was chosen as a Barnes and Noble Discover Great New Writers title.

Towler is also the co-editor, with Ilya Kaminsky, of ''A God in the House: Poets Talk About Faith,” a collection of interviews with prominent American poets, and her memoir, "The Penny Poet of Portsmouth," was published by Counterpoint Press in 2016.

Her essays can be found in anthologies – ''Choice,'' a collection of essays by women writers on reproductive choices, and ''Writers and Their Notebooks.'' She has published poetry, short stories and interviews in The Sun, The Worcester Review, The Tusculum Review, and Poetry International, and she's received fellowships from the Bread Loaf Writers Conference, Yaddo, the New Hampshire State Council on the Arts and Phillips Exeter Academy, where she was the writer-in-residence. She completed an MA in Writing at Johns Hopkins and an MA in English literature from Middlebury College.

Robin Wasserman

Faculty

Robin Wasserman is the author of the novel "Girls on Fire" (HarperColllins). Her essays and reviews have appeared in the Los Angeles Review of Books, Tin House and The New York Times, and her short stories have been included in several anthologies, including "The End is Nigh," "Robot Uprisings" and "Press Start to Play."

A former children's book editor, she is also the New York Times and USA Today Bestselling author of more than 10 novels for young adults, including "The Waking Dark," "Hacking Harvard" and "The Book of Blood and Shadow."

Her books have appeared on the ALA, TAYSHAS, Kirkus, Locus and Booklist best of year lists; been named finalists for the CYBILS, Golden Duck, and Georgia Peach Awards; been adapted for a television miniseries; and been translated into nine languages worldwide.

Adam Wilson

Faculty

Adam Wilson is the author of the novel "Flatscreen" (Harper Perennial, 2012), and the collection of short stories "What's Important is Feeling" (Harper Perennial, 2014).

His short fiction has appeared in The Paris Review, Tin House, Vice and The Best American Short Stories, among other publications. His essays, journalism and criticism have appeared in The New York Times Book Review, The New York Times Style Section, Bookforum, The New Republic, Tin House, NPR and at newyorker.com, among others.

A National Jewish Book Award Finalist and recipient of the Terry Southern Prize, he has taught regularly in the creative writing programs at Columbia University and NYU. He lives in Brooklyn with his wife and son.

In our program, it's traditional for students to refer to their professors as their "mentors." I like this tradition because it reminds faculty of what we aspire to be.

We don't want to be mere lecturers in craft, foisting the same lessons on every student. We are teachers who get to know each student one on one, face to face and in writing, and we tailor our instruction to our students' artistic needs.

Our weeklong summer and winter residencies take place at the Mountain View Grand Resort in Whitefield, New Hampshire. There, we faculty meet with our students (our "mentees") in workshops and seminars. The conversations tend to continue over meals and on the veranda, which overlooks the White Mountains.

After residency, the semester begins. Students send us their work every five weeks; we write thorough and precise editorial letters in response. We make ourselves available to discuss our students' writing beyond these regular exchanges, on the phone and by Gchat and email. No faculty member takes on more than five students at a time.

We're a young program, born in 2006, but we've already seen our students and alumni score book deals with major publishers, including Pantheon, Viking, HarperCollins and Simon & Schuster. One alumnus is a Guggenheim Fellow. One of our alumni was a finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize/First Fiction Award.

From a substantial applicant pool, we accept a cohort of about 16 students each semester, maintaining a student-faculty ratio of 5:1. Students complete four residencies during the four-semester program, and work toward a Master of Fine Arts, a terminal degree that qualifies graduates to teach at the college level.

If you have questions about our program, please don't hesitate to contact our administrative director. If you have questions specifically for me, they will pass them along and I'll get in touch.

I look forward to hearing from you,
Benjamin Nugent

The texts are the only required texts for the MFA program. Other assigned reading will be determined on an individualized basis, as each MFA student designs a reading list with his or her mentor for each semester he or she is enrolled. Students typically read two books per month, including required texts.

1st Semester

1. "The Elements of Style," Strunk & White
2. "Politics and the English Language," George Orwell
3. "Reading Like a Writer," Francine Prose

2nd Semester

1. "How Fiction Works," James Wood (fiction only)
2. "The Art of Memoir," Amy Karr (nonfiction only)
3. “The Nature of the Fun,” David Foster Wallace

3rd Semester (Nonfiction only)

1. "The Situation and the Story," Vivian Gornick

If you’ve already completed your MFA and would like to revise, reconceive or complete a creative manuscript, you may want to check out SNHU's campus-based Advanced Certification in Creative Writing.

This 33-credit program still offers tracks in fiction and nonfiction. However, you'll also get to choose a secondary track, as well:

• The book business and self-promotion
• The teaching of composition

This is also a low-residency program.

A low-residency MFA program offers you the best of both worlds: You can attend the program you want from the comfort of your home, but then a few times throughout your studies, you can go on location with your peers for an in-depth residency.

One such program is the Mountainview Low-Residency MFA at Southern New Hampshire University. It's a 2-year program that features 4 residencies at the Mountain View Grand in New Hampshire – each in January and June. (Both months can be beautiful times of year here.)

These residencies include:

• Faculty seminars
• One-on-one meetings with faculty mentors to plan the upcoming semester
• Peer workshops, to discuss each other's writing
• Readings from students and faculty
• Talks and readings by visiting authors, editors and agents

The residency location – set on 1,700 acres of land – is inspiring and beautiful. It's been a hotel since 1865. In fact, Charles Dickens even spent some time at the Mountain View Grand during one of his American tours.

Many MFA programs limit the number of people accepted into a program, meaning there can be some competition to earn one of the spots in them.

At Southern New Hampshire University, about 16 students are accepted each semester into the Mountainview Low-Residency MFA.

The small number of students in each fall and spring cohort allows each member to get more 1-on-1 time with their mentor.

It can also give you the chance to get to know the other writers in your cohort, since you'll have the opportunity to get to work with them at each of your program's 4 in-person residencies.

By limiting the number of students each semester, we allow you to build a community that you can take with you far beyond graduation.

In a creative writing MFA program, you'll be hyper-focused on developing your own writing skills.

An MFA program can have a very different structure from other master's programs. For example, the Mountainview Low-Residency MFA at Southern New Hampshire University is built around 1-on-1 mentorship instead of traditional classes. 

You'll take part in 4 semester-long workshops, worth 12 credits each. Here, you'll focus on a manuscript that you'll continue building off of throughout your 2-year program – a piece that will be polished and professional.

You'll also spend time penning a collection of essays, writing exercises and short essays throughout the program.

In between each semester, you'll take part in a weeklong, in-person residency. There, you'll continue to meet with the cohort you've been with throughout your program and participate in peer workshops to review one another's work.

The residencies also offer opportunities to meet with faculty, authors, editors and agents. You'll get facetime with your faculty mentor to discuss the upcoming semester.

Overall, an MFA program allows you to dedicate time to your writing, have your work reviewed regularly by a professional and build a community of like-minded individuals.

A Master of Arts and a Master of Fine Arts degree are different degrees. You'll take different courses, and they have different outcomes. So being the "better" degree is subjective.

When it comes to creative writing programs, it's important to decide what your goals are and what you want to get out of it. And at Southern New Hampshire University, you have options.

If you go the MA route at SNHU, you'll take 36 credits to earn your master's online. The online master's in creative writing allows you to both study and write creative work, and you'll also get to take part in peer workshops to help you refine your craft.

The MA also requires a teaching course, which could allow you to help others rise to a new level.

Plus, with the MA, you'll also get to choose from 4 concentrations, should you want to add one to your program:

• Fiction
• Nonfiction
• Poetry
• Screenwriting

If you choose to pursue your MFA at SNHU, you have 2 options: online or low-residency.

The online MFA in Creative Writing is an option for those who are unable to travel. This 48-credit master's program allows you to focus in a wide range of fiction genres, like contemporary, romance, young adult or speculative fiction.

When you finish an online MFA program like the one at SNHU, you should be able to walk away with a publishable piece, better understand the publishing industry and discover opportunities to showcase your work.

A bonus feature to the online MFA is an embedded certificate that's part of the program. You can choose either the certificate in professional writing or online teaching of writing, depending on where you'd like to take your career.

Courses in the online MFA include topics like social media marketing, the business of writing and the publishing ecosystem – topics that can better help you get your name in front of your potential audience.

In addition to the online program, SNHU offers a low-residency MFA writing program. The 2-year program is part mentored correspondence, part weeklong residencies in New Hampshire.

This 60-credit program is highly focused on your choice of fiction or nonfiction. In addition, only about 16 students are accepted each semester, creating a more intimate experience.

The program is intensely focused on completing a manuscript that's prepped for submission to editors. But the program also gives you the tools to teach creative writing, and it positions you for opportunities in the publishing industry.

It's best to study the courses within each program to determine which program is right for you.

An MFA is a degree that specializes in one of the fine arts, including creative writing, visual arts, filmmaking, theater, performing arts or graphic design, among others. Those who pursue an MFA tend to have a creative goal in mind, like becoming an art director or a private acting coach.

With an MFA in Fiction or Nonfiction – like the Mountainview program at Southern New Hampshire University – your goal would most likely be to write and publish a book. You can use your publication history to become a teacher of creative writing at the college level.

Because one of the outcomes of the Mountainview program is to have each student finish with a manuscript of professional quality, you'll have the potential to get on that track even before you graduate.

Yes, an MFA is usually considered a terminal degree.

A terminal degree is one that's academically recognized as being the furthest level of study one can pursue in that area – like the Mountainview MFA at Southern New Hampshire University. It's oftentimes what's needed to qualify to teach creative writing at the collegiate level, combined with a publication history.

Terminal degrees at the master's level aren't as common; typically, that designation goes to the PhD. And while some schools in other countries offer a Doctor of Fine Arts, it's fairly unheard of in the United States, unless it's being given as an honorary degree.

And while they're both considered terminal degrees, an MFA is not academically equivalent to a PhD.

This may differ by school, but a BFA is generally not necessary to pursue an MFA – as long as you meet the institution's admission requirements.

While a bachelor's degree is required to begin a master's program, the type of undergraduate degree may not matter.

With Southern New Hampshire University's Mountainview MFA program, there's no requirement about what bachelor's degree you've already earned. We understand that many people out there change careers over their lifetime, and we try to make it easier for you to make it happen.

At SNHU, admission requirements include:

• Submitting undergraduate transcripts
• Writing a personal statement and assessment
• Turning in a writing sample
• Letters of recommendation

Your writing talents today matter more than which undergraduate program you may have studied years ago.

Costs will vary from school to school. But it's certainly possible to find an affordable MFA program.

The total tuition for the low-residency MFA program at Southern New Hampshire University is only $37,320 for the full 2-year program.

And that's the initial price. You may qualify for financial aid, reducing your current payment through grants and loans. SNHU's Student Financial Services team specializes in helping students create customized payment plans that work for their specific situations.

In addition, there are scholarships available just for those in the SNHU Mountainview MFA program, helping you make an affordable program even more attainable.

Connect with a financial aid specialist today to learn how you can make the cost of an MFA work for you.

There are plenty of benefits to earning your MFA in creative writing – a major one being the credibility it can bring to your work.

If you want training from accomplished writers, feedback from professionals and a community of peers to take the journey with, then an MFA in writing – like the low-residency program at Southern New Hampshire University – certainly could be a good direction to take.