Creative Writing Program students have been accepted into MFA and other graduate programs at top universities around the country. And they publish their work in nationally-distributed magazines, win awards, have their plays produced, and publish books.
Graduates in Creative Writing have found employment in various careers, including:
Management
• Marketing
• Law
• Journalism
• Film
• Education
• Library Science
• Public Relations
• Publishing
• Medicine
What Graduates say about the Creative Writing Program
The CRW program at Le Moyne College not only disciplined me to write, and write a lot, immersing me in the craft of literary composition, but I also gained something of tremendous value, community. The culture of the creative writing program blessed me with dedicated teachers and peers who ultimately shaped my life.
– Tara Taylor, ’00, MFA in Poetry, North Carolina State University
Being a creative writing student at Le Moyne helped me to prepare for the confidence and out of the box thinking that one needs in order to be successful in law school. As a creative writing student, I acquired the ability to read critically and present my personal thoughts and opinions aloud, which are both vital skills for law school.
– Michelle McCabe, ’14, SUNY Buffalo Law School & recipient of the CALI Award (highest grade in research and writing class)
I came out of the program with new ways of self-expression, professors who are still more than willing to help with recommendations and feedback on my writing, and a set of teaching tools that I now use in private tutoring. It's more than I expected and I wouldn't trade my experiences in the program for anything!"
– Tamara Keeney, '08, Information Technology and Public Relations
I loved the creative writing program at Le Moyne College; it's where I really felt I came alive as a writer. I learned and grew through my classes and the encouragement of my professors, without which I would not have felt confident enough to pursue the next level.
– Kelly Addams, ’09, MFA in Fiction, Emerson College
I learned to write poetry, fiction, plays, and screenplays, and most importantly, I learned how to use the knowledge…of how to write in one genre to strengthen my writing in others. I see things every day in screenwriting that I learned by studying poetry, fiction, and plays at Le Moyne.
– Joe Bates, ’14, MFA in Screenwriting, DePaul University
My creative writing courses taught me how to use the power of language and images to impress and convince. As Hemingway said, "You don't need big words to create big emotions."
– Hannah Wilder ’14, Career in Advertising
I knew I'd be at home in the program before I even got here; I didn't know that I'd fall in love. Because of creative writing at Le Moyne, I wrote a novel, edited a literary journal, made best friends, met influential authors, and learned the meaning of living meaningfully. Now I'm in grad school, teaching, and writing. In other words, my dreams came true.
– Ashley O’Mara ’11, doctoral candidate, Syracuse University
How do I join the Creative Writing Program?
Students join the program by declaring a creative writing concentration (if an English major) or a creative writing minor (if a major in another department). In either case, the requirements are the same: 4 writing workshops and 1 literature course.
Mission Statement
The Creative Writing Program enables English majors with a concentration in Creative Writing and Creative Writing minors to become writers and critics of poetry, fiction, plays, nonfiction, and scripts through participation in writing workshops and individual tutorial sessions with instructors, and through the study of contemporary writing and traditional literature.
Learning Goals
Students who take the Creative Writing concentration should be able to:
- create and revise successive drafts of their own imaginative writing (poetry, fiction, creative nonfiction, plays, film scripts and/or new or hybrid forms such as the prose poem)
- employ techniques and strategies appropriate to imaginative writing in one or more genres (or a hybrid genre). For example a student poet might demonstrate facility with metaphors, sound patterns, enjambment; a fiction writer might do so with dialogue, plot development, flashback.
- express reasonable, balanced opinions of peer writing during class workshop discussion, along with constructive suggestions for revision
- complete and organize a manuscript of fiction, poetry, creative nonfiction, tv or film scripts, plays, or works in new or hybrid genres (such as the prose poem). This manuscript can consist of a single work or multiple works that demonstrate professional presentation of the creative writing, appropriate to the genre(s) represented. As a whole the manuscript should be correctly formatted and free of errors – of a quality that could be submitted to a professional journal for publication. Manuscript length will vary according to genre and instructors’ individual requirements.