Poets & Writers – September 2019

SEPT OCT 2019 98

special section MFA PROGRAMS

Faylita Hicks

2018 MFA in Poetry

Sierra Nevada College in Incline Village, Nevada

To how many programs did you apply? Only t wo. I de fini tely shoul d have spread my
wings a little, but the application fees all posed a pretty big problem for me since I
was a low-income student when I started my search. I first applied to Texas State
University’s MFA program. I got into the program and attended from 2010 until
2012, when I left due to personal reasons. Three years later I applied to Sierra
Nevada College’s low-residency MFA program. What criteria were most important
to you during the application process? My first time applying, the only criteria was
that it didn’t require me to move. My fiancé was still alive, and we were planning on
living in San Marcos, Texas, while he continued graduate school. He passed away
before I started my first semester in Texas State’s MFA program in fall 2010, which
definitely ended up affecting my time there. When I was thinking about applying to a
second program, I knew I needed a few important things, including a diverse staff,
remo t e cl a s s op t ions , and pr ofe s sional development. M y fir s t gr adua t e ex p er ienc e
ended up leaving me discouraged when it came to representation in the classroom
and on the syllabus. I wanted to make sure that whatever program I went to next,
I wouldn’t have to worry about being made to feel like my low-income, spoken-
word background and experiences as a Black femme were somehow detrimental
to the quality of my literary work. I was also working full-time at a call center and
needed the health benefits for chronic pain, so I didn’t want to give up my job to
go back to school. That narrowed down my search to low-residency programs
only. I researched several, looking for a program that would allow me to work
with a diverse set of writers whose work and careers had already made an impact
on me. Sierra Nevada College had it all. Did you receive funding? I received the
Two P ine s Tr avel S chol ar ship, w hich hel p e d w i t h t r avel t o and f r om t he re sidenc y
every semester. How did you make ends meet while you were in the program? I
was one of the few students who had to get student loans in order to attend
the program. Not everyone believes in student loans, and I personally wish that
it had not come to that. However, there has never been a point in my life when
I ever made the sort of money I would need to attend a MFA program without
financial assistance. I made a decision that I still believe was the best decision I
could have made regarding my career as a writer—I decided to stop waiting and
get started. Being low-income shouldn’t keep you from pursuing an education.
Did your experience of the program exceed, match, or fall short of your expectations?
Sierra Nevada College’s MFA program exceeded my expectations. The work was
rigorous, and the readings reflected both the best of the traditional canon as well
as the best of contemporary writers. During every residency we had a chance
to dip into workshops for genres outside of our primary focus and to discuss the
business of being a writing professional with the staff and visiting writers or edi-
tors. I graduated feeling like I finally had all the tools I needed to get started in
my career. How would you describe the community of the program? A fairly new
program, SNC was going through its own growing pains when I started, which
was interesting to witness firsthand. A group of passionate writers who genuinely
enjoy one another’s company were working through structural redesigns and
allowing students to manufacture their own experiences through the process
of community discussions, public and private feedback, and conversations with

Established in 2012, the two-year

low-residency MFA program at

Sierra Nevada College offers

degrees in poetry, fiction, and

creative nonfiction. Incoming class

size: 15. Application deadline:

Rolling admissions. Application fee:

$50. Core faculty includes poets

Carolyn Forché, Nathalie Handal,

Lee Herrick, Laura McCullough,

John Murillo, Gailmarie Pahmeier,

June Saraceno, Patricia Smith, Brian

Turner, and Laura Wetherington;

fiction writers Natalie Baszile, Alan

Heathcock, Tim Hernandez, Patrick

Hicks, Rebecca Makkai, Joanne

Meschery, Peter Mountford, and

Sunil Yapa; and creative nonfiction

writers Gayle Brandeis, Benjamin

Busch, Steven Church, Kelle Groom,

Lacy M. Johnson, Suzanne Roberts,

Kristal Sital, Brian Turner, and

Arianne Zwartjes.

sierranevada.edu/academics/

humanities-social-sciences/mfa-in

-creative-writing

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Several merit– and/or need-based za

scholarships are available, including

the Exceptional Manuscript

Scholarship worth $4,000 per

semester for four active semesters.