Applications Open for Children's Literature Fellowship Program at Stony Brook Southampton

The Children’s Literature Fellows, a one-year, graduate-level certificate program sponsored by Stony Brook Southampton’s MFA in Creative Writing and Literature, is now accepting applications for 2017.

Now in its fourth year, this year-long course of instruction—accomplished mostly in distance learning format—was developed by author and Children’s Literature Conference Director Emma Walton Hamilton, MFA in Creative Writing Director Julie Sheehan and YA author/faculty member Patricia McCormick to offer aspiring children’s and young adult authors a more affordable and flexible option than matriculation in a two- or three-year MFA program.

Because not all writers who want to complete projects have the time or the funds to enroll in a full degree program, the Children’s Literature Fellows do their work within a framework tailored to their needs. The program bears 16 graduate level credits, and is customized, affordable, comprehensive, and professionally useful. Twelve Fellows are accepted into the program per year.

During their year, each Fellow completes either one publishable YA or middle grade manuscript, or, for chapter and picture book writers, three to four separate manuscripts.

“There are very few programs like this out there for aspiring children’s literature authors,” says Walton Hamilton. “But children’s literature and YA are among the strongest and fastest growing sectors of the publishing industry right now, so this is valuable for writers on a number of levels. And thanks to the program’s primarily distance learning format, aspiring authors from all over the world are able to take advantage of what it offers. We have had participants in California, Arizona, Florida—even Australia.”

Admission to the Children’s Lit Fellows program is highly selective, and the application process is now open and underway. The application deadline for 2017 is December 1, 2016.