Writing, BFA

You're a writer. Join a unique community of poets, fiction and nonfiction writers, storytellers, and artists at Pratt.

A group of students sitting in a garden enclosed by white buildings and surrounded by trees and plants. They are listening to a faculty member. — Professor Laura Elrick teaches students the ritual of paper-making from plants grown in Pratt's Textile Dye Garden.

Type: Undergraduate, BFA
Credits: 126
Duration: 4 Years
Courses: Plan of Study
School and Department: School of Liberal Arts and Sciences,
Writing

Write every day.

A group of students sits at a table, talking to each other with animated expressions

At Pratt, you’ll be writing from day one in a supportive, joyful, transformative environment that puts your writing practice at the heart of your studies.

Our extraordinary faculty will partner with you and mentor you, helping you to explore, refine, reimagine, and own your talents.

Beyond your deep dive into poetry, fiction, or nonfiction each semester, you’ll have the chance to take specialized classes in songwriting, journalism, ecopoetics, sci-fi, stand-up comedy, children’s book writing, and more.

Your senior thesis will be the expression of your voice, your questions, and your creative ambition. This book-length project can take the shape of a novel, memoir, screenplay, or graphic novel, or a collection of poems, short stories, or experimental essays (or a mix of forms and images).

Students in the Writing program have their own dedicated 24/7 writing spaces with desks, cozy furniture, computers, free printing, art supplies, and a library of faculty, student, and alumni publications.

Installation by Cassandra Bristow, BFA Writing ’22 — “Illuminated” installation by Cassandra Bristow, BFA Writing ’22, in the new writing studios

Write at an art school.

Expand your creativity by exploring other mediums—painting, fashion, animation, and more.

Collaborate with student artists, filmmakers, and designers and find inspiration from faculty across campus.

Explore Pratt’s rich array of minors, including Art of the Book, Black Studies, Photography, Social Justice, Teaching Writing in NYC, and many others.

Write in Brooklyn. And Berlin!

An aerial view of Pratt Brooklyn campus showing leafy trees and brick buildings.

Two students in front of a building in Berlin. They are pointing at the building.

Brooklyn’s literary scenes are endlessly fascinating. The borough is home to diverse literary communities and experimental, alternative publishing houses and non-profits, some of them led by our visionary faculty. (For one example, check out the *Belladonna Collaborative.)

No matter who you are or what you write, you’ll find your people in Brooklyn, and we’ll help you do that through courses like Community as Classroom.

If you’re interested in study abroad, spend a semester studying in our Pratt Berlin program.

Write your future.

Eight book covers — Books from the bookstore Twenty Stories founded by Emory Harkins and Alexa Trembly, both BFA Writing ’16

Connect with publishers, agents, and literary professionals through our specially-tailored Writing Lives pathway and our course Writer as Worker.

Prepare for an authentic and sustainable working and writing life through our internship program.

Passionate about social justice? Pursue a self-designed community-engagement project via our innovative Fieldwork class.

Meet renowned writers and learn from their experiences through our events series.

After graduation, we help you to stay connected with us and with other amazing graduates.

The Experience

Stand Up Comedy for Writers. Video by Max Berger.
Read More in Prattfolio.

Socially engaged and deeply personalized, our tight-knit writing community values a plurality of voices and approaches to writing, both on and off the page. You’ll gather with your peers twice a week for intensive studios, where feedback sessions, generative writing, inspiring reading, and collaborative thinking take place. First-year foundational courses span critical thinking, research, world literature, the elements of writing, and immersion in New York City. After your first year, dive into specialized writing electives, classes in art and design, liberal arts study, transdisciplinary minors, and opportunities to edit student publications like The Prattler and Ubiquitous. A small student-to-faculty ratio on the Brooklyn campus fosters an intimate sense of community, as do on-campus readings, our 24/7 student writing spaces, and departmental social events.

Writing in NYC

Taken in the first year, our “Community as Classroom” course will immerse you in literary series, institutions, and activities across the city, supporting your discovery of emerging artistic scenes and galvanizing literary heritage.

Career & Professional Development

We help our students build authentic, creative, and sustainable writing and working lives. Our third year course “Writer as Worker” provides concrete skills and guidance to discern, acquire, and plan for internships while in the program and meaningful employment after. Weekly visits with guest authors, agents, editors, journalists, teachers, filmmakers, and communications experts help you make informed choices about the work/life experiences you’d like to explore. You’ll gain practical survival skills for how to successfully apply for jobs, grants, fellowships, and grad school so that you can build a future that inspires you.

Internship & Fieldwork

Our dedicated internship coordinator will help you identify, apply for, and make the most of NYC internship opportunities. Our students regularly intern at publishing houses, literary agencies, film and tv studios, podcast networks, newspapers and magazines, arts organizations, and community nonprofits, gaining invaluable skills and mentors along the way. Fieldwork is a unique course offering for students who want to gain experience “in the field” that a more traditional internship can’t support: it’s an opportunity for a student to design a community-engagement project or artistic activity they otherwise couldn’t accomplish. Our credit-bearing internship and fieldwork seminars ensure your project becomes an educational opportunity through which you can discern the material realities of the writing life.

Events & Visiting Writers

Our Writer at Large program, the annual Michael Mahoney Memorial Reading, the MFA’s Writing Activisms series, and other events bring renowned writers to campus for readings, workshops, and manuscript consultations. Beyond these events, department faculty regularly invite writers to spend time with their classes. Recent guests include Ottessa Moshfegh, Ross Gay, Simone White, Layli Long Soldier, Alexander Chee, Jonas Hassen Khemiri, Michelle Tea, Asiya Wadud, Chloë Bass, Sarah Thankam Mathews, and Eugene Lim.

Our Faculty

Writing’s faculty are distinguished writers, artists, and editors who are deeply committed to nurturing the potential of each student. Bringing different views, methods, and perspectives they provide a rigorous and singular educational experience. See all Writing faculty and administrators.

Sharifa Rhodes-Pitts
Associate Professor
Laura Henriksen
Adjunct Associate Professor
Christian Hawkey
Professor
Laura Elrick
Associate Professor
Dianca Potts
Adjunct Associate Professor
Christopher Perez
Visiting Professor
Anna Moschovakis
Adjunct Associate Professor – CCE

Our Alumni

A group of young people are gathered around a teacher as they look at her computer screen. They are in a classroom with a grey door in the background.

Where They Work

Carly Tagen-Dye, Editorial Assistant, People Magazine
Anika Jade Levy, Founding Editor, Forever Magazine
Alexa Trembly and Emory Harkins, Twenty Stories Bookstore
Ryan Carson, Founder, NO OD NY
Erin Perez, Poetry Teacher, Saint Ann’s School

MFA Programs Recently Attended by BFA Writing Alumni

Brown University MFA Literary Arts Program
Columbia University MFA Writing Program
University of Wyoming MFA Creative Writing Program
The New School MFA Creative Writing Program

Recent Alumni Publications

Adrian Shirk, Heaven Is a Place on Earth (Counterpoint, 2022)
Laura Henriksen, Laura’s Desires (Nightboat Books, 2024)
Phoebe Robinson, Please Don’t Sit on My Bed in Your Outside Clothes (Tiny Reparations Books, 2021)
Brandi Spering, This I Can Tell You (Perennial Press, 2021)
Kate Gavino, A Career in Books (Plume, 2022)

Success Stories

A woman with long brown hair in a blue blouse smiling outdoors.

For Laura Henriksen, BFA Writing ’12, One Teacher’s Mentorship Opened Whole Possible Futures

Prattfolio Story

Writing Alumni Stories

Page

Author James Hannaham reads from a red book in a narrow venue lit in orange-red tones

Discovering Our Literary City

Prattfolio Story

This American Life, The Out Crowd, episode 688, by Lola Dupre

Team Featuring Writing Alumna Lina Misitzis Awarded Pulitzer Prize for This American Life Episode

Article

Ready for More?

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From the Catalog

View all Writing courses

The BFA in Writing at Pratt Institute prepares students to become highly proficient and self-sustaining creative writers. Through our studio-based approach and our commitments to inquiry, creative research, and critical self-reflection, we invite students to expand their creative range, to investigate the cultural and historical forces that have sculpted the literary traditions they seek to enter, to become expert practitioners, and to explore the other fields on offer at Pratt. Our focus is students’ creative expression, balanced with professional preparation and community engagement via hands-on courses, internships, and colloquia, so that students are prepared to navigate the changing literary landscape. Our pedagogy combines rigor with care, and the department administration and faculty work actively on behalf of students to shape their time at Pratt and to connect them to campus resources, so that—despite the solitude that sometimes attends the writing life—students feel supported and equipped to achieve their goals.

Via completion of the program, BFA Writing students will:

Expand their creative process through practices of creative making, experimentation, and play
Learn to ask and investigate a question through the refinement of curiosity, attention, and research
Acquire an eloquent critical language for discussions of their work and its place in diverse literary traditions
Demonstration through informed reading and writing practices, an understanding of the social and historical forces that have shaped their imagination
Develop expertise in a selected form or genre
Become a self-sustaining practitioner by
- Learning to assemble a revised, cohesive, and polished body of work
- Acquiring professional skills and knowledge that will support a working life