Life After the MFA

Career Paths

MFA Alumni

• Patricia McCormick (WCYA), a two-time National Book Award finalist. Her books have been named to the New York Times Notable Books list, Publishers Weekly's Best Books list, NPR’s Best Books list, and iTunes' Best Books list.
• Gina Chung (Fiction), 2021–2022 Center for Fiction/Susan Kamil Emerging Writer Fellow and winner of the Pushcart Prize for Mantis, published in Wigleaf.
• Margaux Weisman (Fiction), an editor with a decade of experience working with major publishing houses, including HarperCollins and Penguin Random House.
• Randy Winston (Fiction), fiction editor at Slice magazine and the creator of Milkshake Scholar, a milkshake interview series on Instagram. Current Writing Programs manager at The Center for Fiction. 
• Stephanie Danler (Fiction), creator and executive producer of the Sweetbitter series on Starz. Winner of the 2019 Robert B. Heilman Award from the Sewanee Review.
• Erin Swan (Fiction), Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net nominee. 
• Nidhi Pugalia (Fiction), associate editor at Viking Books. Authors she has worked with include Julianne Escobedo Shepherd, Sahaj Kaur Kohli, Tana French, Chanel Miller, Tracy Chevalier, Timothy Egan, Robert Greene, Colin Dickey, Charlotte Alter, Jessica Goudeau, David Baldacci, Sara Blaedel, Flea, and Abbi Jacobson.
• Allison Moorer (Nonfiction), country singer-songwriter nominated for the Academy, GRAMMY, Americana Music Association, and Academy of Country Music Awards. Winner of the Hall-Waters Prize for Excellence in Southern Writing.
• AE Osworth (Fiction), whose debut novel, We Are Watching Eliza Bright, was long-listed for The Center for Fiction's First Novel Prize and named a Best Book of 2021 by NPR. 
• Kyle Lucia Wu (Fiction), managing director at Kundiman and senior editor at Joyland. She is the author of the novel Win Me Something, an NPR Best Book of the Year, and has received the Asian American Writers’ Workshop Margins Fellowship.
• Keisha Bush (Fiction), Riggio Honors Teaching Fellow and recipient of an NSPE Dean’s Scholarship. Her debut novel, No Heaven for Good Boys, is a New York Times Editors' Choice.
• Chris Beha (Fiction), editor of Harper’s Magazine. His third novel, The Index of Self-Destructive Acts, was long-listed for the 2020 National Book Award in Fiction.
• David Leo Rice (Fiction), author of the novels A Room in Dodge City, A Room in Dodge City, Volume 2, Angel House, and The New House and the story collection Drifter and editor of the nonfiction anthology Children of the New Flesh.
• Meredith Westgate (Fiction), assistant fiction editor at the Los Angeles Review. Her debut novel, The Shimmering State, is a Belletrist Book Club Pick and received a starred review in Publishers Weekly. 
• Phineas Lambert (Fiction), program director at WriteOn NYC, alongside New School faculty member Helen Schulman. Former publisher and director of the literary magazine Guernica.
• Kacen Callendar (WCYA), bestselling and award-winning author of numerous novels, including the Lambda Literary Award–winning Hurricane Child and the National Book Award–winning King and the Dragonflies.
• Alysia Abbott (Nonfiction), author of Fairyland: A Memoir of My Father, a New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice, an ALA Stonewall Award winner, winner of the Madame Figaro Prix Heroine, and finalist for the Lambda Literary Awards. 
• Lee Matthew Goldberg (Fiction), author of the novels The Ancestor, Slow Down, The Mentor,The Desire Card, and Orange City and the young adult series Runaway Train and Grenade Bouquets. Co-curator of The Guerrilla Lit Reading Series and editor in chief and co-founder of Fringe.
• Dianca Potts (Fiction), a Kimbilio Fiction Fellow, a VONA Voices alum, a former online editor of Well-Read Black Girl, and a 2015 Pushcart Prize Nominee. 
• Mary Dixie Carter (Fiction), former publishing director of The Observer and author of the novel The Photographer.
• Jennifer Close (Fiction), bestselling author of Girls in White Dresses, The Smart One, and The Hopefuls.
• Zakiya Dalila Harris (Nonfiction), former assistant editor at Knopf/Doubleday and author of The Other Black Girl, a TV adaptation of which is currently in development with Tara Duncan, Temple Hill Entertainment, and Hulu.
• Scott Hess (Fiction), author of six novels, including Skyscraper, a Lambda Literary Award finalist, and The Butcher’s Sons, a Kirkus Reviews Best Book of 2015.
• Stephan Lee (WCYA), senior editor at Bustle, former editor at Entertainment Weekly, and author of K-Pop Confidential. 
• Yahdon Israel (Nonfiction), senior editor at Simon & Schuster, editorial director of Northside Media, and editor in chief of Brooklyn magazine. 
• Samantha Kirby (Fiction), researcher for and editorial contributor to The New School’s centennial publication A Drama in Time: The New School Century. Author of the story collection Lunatiques.
• Jennifer Benka (Poetry), president and executive director of the Academy of American Poets. Author of the poetry collections Pinko and A Box of Longing With Fifty Drawers and the artist's book Preamble, a collaboration with artist Mark Wagner.
• Ellen Hagen (Fiction), head of the Poetry and Theater departments at the DreamYard Project. Recipient of the 2020 New York Foundation for the Arts fellowship in poetry.
• Ben Hedin (Fiction), a GRAMMY and IDA Award nominee and winner of the Critics’ Choice Award for Best Historical Documentary.
• Sufjan Stevens (Fiction), GRAMMY and Academy Award–nominated singer-songwriter and co-founder of the Asthmatic Kitty label.
• Jenny Han (WCYA), No. 1 New York Times bestselling author of To All The Boys I’ve Loved Before, executive producer of the Netflix film series Creator, and co-showrunner of the series The Summer I Turned Pretty. 

Undergrad Alumni

• Ricky Tucker (BA Creative Writing), LAMBDA Literary Emerging Writers Fellow and author of And the Category Is …, a Los Angeles Times Bestseller and one of Electric Literature’s Most Anticipated LGBTQ+ Books of 2022.
• Ted Kerr (Riggio), recipient of the Best Journalism award from POZ magazine, co-founder of Foundational Sharing, and founding member of the organization What Would An HIV Doula Do? Ted was a founding member of Exposure: Edmonton's Queer Arts and Culture Festival.
• Buku Sarkar (Riggio), a writer and photographer whose work has appeared in various journals including the New York Review of Books, the New York Times' Lens blog, and the Huffington Post. They have been exhibited at ICP, Art Basel Miami, and other venues around the world.
• Renée Watson (BA Liberal Arts), No. 1 New York Times bestselling author, educator, and community activist. Her young adult novel Piecing Me Together (Bloomsbury, 2017) received the Coretta Scott King Award and Newbery Honor. She founded the I, Too Arts Collective, is on the Council of Writers for the National Writing Project, and is a member of the Academy of American Poets’ Education Advisory Council.
• Kate Cox (BA Writing), editor at The New Food Economy and co-founder of and contributor to MWOMA. 
• John Emrys Eller (Riggio), director, producer, and journalist. His work has appeared in venues and outlets including the Tribeca Film Festival, ESPN, The Guardian, and The Atlantic.