General questions about the graduate program and the graduate theme in Literature can be answered by:

Dr. Rebecca Ann Bach
Director of Graduate Studies
University Hall 5028
(205) 934-8594
rbach@uab.edu

For information about the Creative Writing theme, contact:

Adam Vines
Director of Creative Writing
University Hall 5024
(205) 975-5317
abvines@uab.edu

For information about the Rhetoric and Composition theme, contact:

Dr. Cynthia Ryan
Director of Professional Writing Programs
University Hall 5038
(205) 934-8600
cynryan@uab.edu

Interested in the UAB Department of English Master's Program? We hope you'll consider joining us in the study and promotion of language and literature in Birmingham!

Listed below are some of the most common questions we field from prospective students. We hope you'll find them informative, and if you have further questions please don't hesitate to ask. We are easily accessible by email (EnglishGrad@uab.edu) or by telephone (205-934-4250). You can also contact specific program directors through the Graduate Programs Contacts page.

How do you plan to pay for college? It's something everyone has to think about, no matter your background or situation. Guidance on financing your education is available through the Cost & Aid website and through the UAB Graduate School.

Detailed tuition and fees information can be found on the UAB Students site.

The English Department offers the following three forms of support for MA students:

Graduate Teaching Assistantships

The Department of English offers a competitive Graduate Teaching Assistantship (GTA) program. Typically, assistantships require students to tutor in the University Writing Center and teach sections of English composition (as second-year students). In exchange, GTAs receive a modest stipend which is sufficient to cover tuition and fees with some left over for living expenses.

GTA positions begin during the fall semester of each academic year with the first round of applications due by February 15 of the prior academic year. These applications are evaluated and letters of offer issued by mid-March. Prospective graduate assistants will then have until April 15 to accept or decline the offer. After April 15, if assistantship positions are still available, a second round of applications will be considered.

The application for a Graduate Assistantship consists of the MA program application submitted through the Graduate School (which will need to be completed by the deadlines noted above) as well as a form, including a short essay, which you can submit using the button below.

Achievement Scholarship

The English Department offers one fellowship a year to an incoming Masters student who has faced significant obstacles in their personal and academic journey and who has shown a noteworthy determination to succeed in the face of adversity. The winner of the fellowship will have their tuition paid for the full 31 hours required for the MA, provided that the MA is completed within two academic years: beginning in the Fall of the first year and finishing in the Spring of the second year. The recipient must be in good academic standing by the end of the first year for the funding to be renewed for a second year. If the Achievement Scholarship recipient also receives a Graduate Teaching Assistantship, the full GTA amount will be paid as a stipend during the scholarship period.

Collins Family Scholarship

Each year, the UAB English Department offers the Collins Family Scholarship to a student pursuing an MA in English with a concentration in Creative Writing. Winners are selected by a committee of faculty on the basis of outstanding performance in creative writing classes. The award amount is typically $1,000.

More Information

For more information about any of these programs and fellowships, contact the Director of Graduate Studies.

Choosing an Advisor

Accepted, degree-seeking students are assigned either the Graduate Director or the Director of Creative Writing as their first advisor in UAB English.

As soon as you have identified a graduate faculty member within your theme with whom you would like a mentoring relationship, you should secure that faculty member's agreement to serve as the chair of your individual Graduate Studies Committee (GSC). This selection will likely occur by the end of the first year of graduate study.

You are expected to initiate this action and report it to the Graduate Director. You are encouraged to meet frequently with faculty to plan coursework and assess progress toward your degree.

Securing a Graduate Studies Committee

Prior to beginning a thesis (Plan I) or taking area examinations (Plan II), you must complete the selection of your GSC.

Working with your GSC chair, you will select at least two other graduate faculty members. If you are taking area examinations, select members of the graduate faculty who will be the graders of your examinations. If you are writing a thesis, select members of the graduate faculty who will read and comment on your thesis both before and during the defense. In some cases, it may be helpful to choose a GSC member from outside of the UAB English Department. In such a case, the external reader must be either a member of the UAB graduate faculty or possess the credentials (terminal academic degree in a relevant field or, in the case of creative writing theses, publication credentials) that warrant an ad hoc appointment to the UAB graduate faculty. Students must provide the Director of Graduate Studies with the vitae of any person whose ad hoc appointment to the UAB graduate faculty will need to be secured.

More Information

For more information about identifying your advisor or forming your graduate studies committee, contact the Director of Graduate Studies or the Director of Creative Writing.

All English MA Program applications are processed through the UAB Graduate School. Applicants can apply using the online Graduate School application form.

A typical English MA application will present the following elements:

These are the key elements of an M.A. program application. Clearly, it will take some time to collect and submit all these materials, so it pays to keep one eye on the application deadlines which you can find on the Graduate School website. Once the application is complete and submitted, it typically takes about two weeks for the relevant English department committees to review and render a decision on whether to accept or decline the applicant.

We accept new students into the program each semester—Fall, Spring, and Summer—according to the deadlines listed on the Graduate School pages. Do note, however, that graduate assistantships begin each Fall semester. If you wish to be considered for a graduate assistantship, it is helpful to submit the application by mid-February for the fullest consideration. We have only a limited number of these assistantships at our disposal, and the first set of offers for the following academic year is issued on or about March 15.

As always, if you have any questions about the application requirements or the application process, do not hesitate to contact Dr. Rebecca Bach, the Director of Graduate Studies, at rbach@uab.edu.

Non-Traditional Students

The application procedure described above presents the most typical case, and it is perfectly appropriate for undergraduate English majors who wish to continue their studies in the graduate program. The discipline of English, however, sometimes attracts non-traditional students—persons who have been out of school for some years but who are going back to pursue some new interest or career path, creative writers who have "day jobs" but want to finally finish that novel, secondary school English teachers who want to gain some additional credit hours and insights to use professionally, etc. Such students may well fit into the M.A. program, even without some key elements of the "typical" application. Such returning students may need to take a different path: the non-degree application.

The non-degree application is much simpler, and it is managed entirely through the Graduate School (we do not even see the application here in the English department), but non-degree graduate students are perfectly free to register for graduate-level courses in the English department. Then, assuming the courses taken as a non-degree student have been satisfying and the student has performed well, it is possible to submit a complete program application for admission as a regular English graduate student. It is permissible subsequently to transfer as many as 12 non-degree graduate credit hours into the degree program, thus insuring that those non-degree credits are not "wasted."

Welcome to UAB’s Graduate Program in English! If you are interested in broadening your world through reading and developing your writing skills and imaginative capacities, then this is definitely the place to be. As a student in our MA program, you will take a broad array of courses while also focusing your interests in one of three areas: creative writing, literature, or rhetoric and composition. Throughout your time here, our world-class professors will encourage you to develop your own interests, and they will talk with you about future goals, so that your time here is tailored around what you hope to achieve. Our MA graduates have gone on to do so many remarkable things: they are novelists and poets; English teachers; journalists; nonprofit pioneers; digital content strategists; technical writers—the list goes on. We are so proud of our students and what they have accomplished, and we hope you will consider joining our supportive, collaborative community!

^{Learn more about the Creative Writing experience}

Why UAB?

We are proud that UAB has been designated by the Carnegie Foundation as one of 51 national universities with both “Very High Research Activity” and “Community Engagement” and that Times Higher Education recently named UAB as the No. 1 young university in the United States. Our English department features small classes and attentive faculty.

At UAB you will work with faculty who are excellent teachers and mentors and also recognized experts in their fields. Our faculty includes many professors who publish and present their scholarship in venues all over the world. Many of our graduates have attended prestigious Ph.D. and M.F.A. programs; others have gone on to careers in publishing, technical writing, and advertising and to successful teaching careers; and still others—thanks to their skills in writing, analysis, and communications—have embarked on careers in human resources and customer relations, in database and library.

How to Apply

Choosing an Advisor

Financial Support

Want More Information?

Please explore our program and admissions requirements. If you have questions, contact Dr. Rebecca Bach, graduate program director, at rbach@uab.edu or (205) 934-8594. To receive additional information about the program, complete the form below.