MFA Grants & Awards

MFA Grants & Awards URIT Seth Landman

While the MFA program tries to offer travel and thesis grants annually, they are subject to the Department of English and College of Humanities and Fine Arts budget allocations.

MFA Travel Grants

MFA Travel Grants URIT Seth Landman

The MFA Program, with funds provided by the Graduate School and the English Department, is able to support opportunities for students to present their work at readings, conferences and other events. Funds are divided equally between poets and fiction writers.

Criteria: Grants of $100-$300 are offered to offset travel costs associated with an invitation to read, present a paper, or representing a literary organization at a conference. There are two opportunities to apply for Travel Funds, when available: one in the fall and one in the spring. Look for the call for applications and respond by the deadline. Travel Grants are dependent on annual funding. 

MFA Thesis Grants

MFA Thesis Grants URIT Seth Landman

Awarded to graduate students in their second year, thesis grants are stipends to help with creative development and thesis research. These funds are made available to the MFA through the generosity of the Graduate School's Dean. Awards range from $180 to $750, but may vary depending on the number of qualified applications received. They are distributed in the spring. Thesis Grants are dependent on annual funding. 

Thesis grants can be used to support:

  • Fieldwork, research, and/or travel to locations and sets relevant to your work in progress
  • Residencies at an artist's colony to set aside time for sustained concentration on a manuscript and to engage in conversation with artists working in other fields
  • You may propose other activities in the grant as long as they comprise creative development or research undertakings requiring discrete financial support to achieve specific goals

Eligible candidates must:

  • Be in the second year of the program
  • Be in good academic standing, making good progress towards the degree
  • Have selected a thesis advisor who supports your grant application
  • Wish to engage in one or more of the kinds of creative development/research activity supported by the grant program

MFA Program Annual Awards

MFA Program Annual Awards URIT Seth Landman

A call for submissions for the following prizes goes out annually in February:

Poetry Prizes

The Academy of American of Poets Prize: Given for excellence in the craft of writing poetry. ($100 to winner from AAP).

Best New Poets Anthology: Submissions are judged for nomination to Best New Poets for consideration. Winners may be published in Best New Poets the following year.

The Daniel and Merrily Glosband MFA Fellowship in Poetry: Awarded to recognize and support poets of exceptional merit and promise at a critical stage of their progress. (Approximate award: $3,000)

The Deborah Slosberg Memorial Award in Poetry: Given by Mr. and Mrs. Jay Slosberg in memory of Deborah Slosberg, who studied at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst, to MFA candidates whose work in poetry or prose constitutes substantial and worthy achievement over their careers in the MFA Program. (Approximate award: $1,400)

The Karen Skolfield and Dennis Goeckel MFA Award in Poetry: This award was established by alumnus, Karen Skolfield and her husband Dennis Goeckel, to recognize excellence in poetry by an MFA candidate. The award of approximately $1,000 is given in even years only.

Fiction Prizes

The Harvey Swados Fiction Prize: Named for the novelist and short-story writer who taught on the MFA faculty from 1970 to 1972, awarded for excellence in the craft of fiction writing. (Approximate award $1,400)

The Deborah Slosberg Memorial Award in Fiction: Given by Mr. and Mrs. Jay Slosberg in memory of Deborah Slosberg, who studied at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst, to MFA candidates whose work in poetry or prose constitutes substantial and worthy achievement over their careers in the MFA Program. (Approximate award $1,400)

The Cara Parravani Memorial Award in Fiction: Offered by the family of Cara Parravani (MFA ’07) for excellence in fiction. ($250 award)

The James W. Foley University of Massachusetts Memorial Prize honors the conviction and courage of alumnus James Wright Foley. Jim studied fiction and literature in the MFA for Poets and Writers at the University of Massachusetts Amherst from 1999 until 2003. In his years as a student here, he dedicated himself to working with marginalized communities, helping others to find their voices. He later became a freelance journalist on the front lines in Libya and Syria, where he was kidnapped and horrifically executed by the so-called Islamic State in August of 2014. This Memorial Prize seeks to support the work of writers who express a political awareness and sensitivity in their prose, and whose concerns extend beyond the limits of their particular circumstances and home language. The prize will be awarded annually to current MFA candidates, based on a sample of prose, in the form of an honorarium generated by an endowment. ($750 for the Award Winner; $250 for the Honorable Mention)