MA
Postgraduate degree
This specialist Master’s in Creative Writing is for writers for children and young adults who aim to complete a novel, series of picture books or shorter stories. It's a practical course, taught by experienced lecturers who are all published children's writers and/or industry professionals.
Designed for those already on the way to writing at publication level, whether in picture books, middle grade or young adult (YA) fiction, this online MA in Writing for Young People supports you to refine your craft while learning about the interaction of creative and business considerations in the modern publishing industry.
This is an online version of an already well-established course, introduced to provide greater flexibility for ambitious writers for whom studying on-campus isn't an option.
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Books published by graduates from this course include:
"I recommend Bath Spa because it is a community that fosters, challenges, and grows writers into authors ..."
Alyssa Hollingsworth, MA Writing for Young People
“I'm not sure I would have had the space or the motivation to write a novel without the MA in Writing for Young People and it certainly wouldn't have been as good as it was.”
Sally Nicholls, MA Writing for Young People
The MA in Writing for Young People is well known throughout children’s and young adult publishing for developing emerging writers' work to publishable quality. Our alumni include Sally Nicholls, Elen Caldecott, CJ Skuse, Emma Carroll, Jasbinder Bilan, Damaris Young, Sophie Kirtley, Kate Mallinder, Yasmin Rahman and David Hofmeyr.
Writing workshops lie at the heart of the course, helping you to gain wide-ranging insights into your writing strengths and weaknesses and to experiment through your writing in a supportive but disciplined environment. A critical aspect of the course is the chance to meet other aspiring writers, to learn from them and to develop the creative networks that will support you in the next stage of your writing career.
Workshop modules lead to the production of a full manuscript – or substantial proportion of one – with a clear understanding of how to complete the book. While most students focus on Middle Grade or Young Adult prose fiction, others choose picture books, chapter books, collections, verse novels or even narrative non-fiction for their manuscript project.
Your writing will be underpinned by increased understanding of children and young people as readers, of the current publishing industry, and of good practice in submitting to agents and publishers. You'll acquire the core skills and knowledge working authors need in order to give their work the best chance of success in the marketplace.
In addition to a teaching team who are all published authors, with wide-ranging experience of various areas of publishing and the Arts, the course hosts a programme of guest speakers and activities throughout the academic year.
This distance learning course is taught part-time over two years.
Year one
The Context module explores the main categories of books published for children and young people, with a focus on reading as a writer and on understanding your audience at the different stages of childhood and adolescence. We consider a wide range of texts from picture books and chapter books to middle grade and young adult novels; verse novels and some narrative non-fiction are also included.
The Writing Workshop module is an opportunity to explore various aspects of the craft of writing for children and young people. This module focuses on experimentation, trying new things and developing your range, working with your tutor and your peers to test and try out your own ideas.
The Manuscript module involves working on a one-on-one basis with a tutor to develop, draft, edit and revise your major project – part of a full-length novel, or a collection of pieces.
Year two
The second Writing Workshop module enables you to continue to experiment and to develop your skills as a writer, and to start to focus more on your final manuscript project.
The second Context module considers the realities of the children’s publishing industry, publishing as a business and the practicalities involved in turning a manuscript into a book. In addition to looking at the work of agents, editors, sales teams, right professionals, marketing teams and publicists, you'll develop the professional skills all working authors need to position and promote their own work.
Work on the manuscript continues throughout the second year of study, and will be your main focus in the final trimester, between June and September.
This course includes or offers the following modules. Please check the programme document for more information on which modules are core, required or optional.
You'll be assessed through a range of tasks, including creative portfolios, samples of work-in-progress, reflective commentaries, a selection of publishing-focused pieces, and your manuscript submissions – this might be a portion of a novel, or a selection of picture/chapter books or other short works.
Writing Workshop and Context Modules
You'll be taught through a mix of online lectures/workshops, and one-to-one tutorials. We aim to keep the writing workshops small so that there's sufficient time, support, and attention for each person’s work.
Part-time students will have one module per taught trimester.
The Manuscript Module
All students will focus on the Manuscript Module from June to September. The manuscript is taught via one-to-one tutorials, working with a tutor who is a published author with particular knowledge of your field of work, or who can bring complementary expertise to bear on it.
What’s the time commitment in a usual week?
Our teaching weeks run October-January and February-May, with June-September comprised of one-to-one tutorials on a schedule negotiated by the tutor and student.
With some exceptions, during teaching weeks students will usually have one three-hour workshop per week. We let students know during the summer what their provisional timetable is.
We suggest that part-time students treat the course as a part-time (0.5 equivalent) job, setting aside roughly 17.5-20 hours per week for workshops, homework, assessment preparation, reading, participation in optional projects, guest lectures, and independent study.
To find out more about how we teach and how you'll learn, please read our information on Your Learning and Teaching at BSU.
"I have always wanted to be a children's author but knew I needed structure, support and mentorship to help me write the best possible novel I could."
Jess Butterworth, MA Writing for Young People
This course has an excellent reputation across children’s and young adult publishing, with name recognition among agents, editors and booksellers. We're regularly approached by publishing professionals who want to work with us.
We have extensive links across the industry, with individuals, companies and cultural organisations such as the Bath Festival of Children’s Literature. The University works closely with partners in the creative and cultural industries, the third sector, and education. Our current international partnership network includes Vermont College of Fine Arts, the Norwegian Institute for Children’s Books, and Ashoka University (India) via a collaborative project with the Green Lit Fest (India).
In 2022-2023, students had various opportunities to participate in exciting optional projects, including:
Over 70 of our alumni have now been traditionally published. Our graduates may go into editing (freelance and at a publishing house), agenting, rights, marketing, publicity, sales, events management and teaching. Others can pursue careers in journalism, writing for magazines, teaching, various aspects of publishing, and television.
Our published graduates have secured contracts with, among others:
Opportunities for new writing appear all the time, and we'll encourage you to participate in these at the stage that is right for you.
We offer a programme of online evening lectures from a variety of guest authors and industry professionals. You'll be able to attend events run by other departments where these are relevant to your work – or of personal interest. The richness of the University experience lies in where it moves beyond the specific course, and opens up new possibilities and new perspectives.
Resources such as handouts, links and videos are provided through our virtual learning environment.
Develop a wealth of indispensable digital skills that you can take into your future career. One of only three Adobe Creative Campuses in the UK, we provide all Bath Spa students with access to the full Adobe Creative Suite, giving you the tools to communicate creatively, whatever your course or chosen professional field.
"[The course] introduced me to my agent. It helped me get my manuscript into a good-enough state to be considered by the professionals."
Chris Vick, MA Writing for Young People
| Student | Annual tuition fee |
|---|---|
| UK part time | £4,733* |
| International part time | £9,220* |
*This course is studied part-time and remotely over two years, with tuition fees payable in both years of study.
You may need to pay additional course costs over and above your tuition fees, for example, for specialist equipment or trips and visits. Please check the course Programme Document (linked under the main image on this page) for details of any additional costs. You can also read our Additional Course Costs Policy for further information.
Please visit our Funding pages for an overview of the funding options that may be available, including scholarships and bursaries.
We relish how different all our students are. Our MA Writing for Young People students are passionate about children’s and Young Adult literature, committed to developing their craft, open to considering a wide range of views and willing to engage with all sorts of aspects of writing and publishing books for children and teens.
Our students are also able to be analytical and take a conscientious approach to helping their peers develop and learn through constructive feedback.
We're looking for people who have the potential to be published, who have some understanding of the current children’s publishing landscape, and who have something special to contribute to their fellow students.
Most applicants will have an undergraduate degree; however we're willing to look at applications from those with non-traditional academic or work backgrounds who meet the criteria summarised above. See our Accreditation of Prior Learning (APL) web page to learn more.
It's not necessary to have a degree in English, Creative Writing or related disciplines; your engagement with children’s and Young Adult literature as a reader and writer is more important than the field of previous study.
Ready to apply? Click the 'apply now' button in the centre of this page.
Need more guidance? Head to our how to apply webpages.
We review all applications and try to provide a small amount of feedback even if your application is not successful. Our most common feedback to applicants is:
Interviews take the form of an informal 20-minute conversation with two members of the MA Writing for Young People team.
All interviews are held online.
We ask some general questions about you, your writing and what you're reading, then we provide an opportunity for you to ask us questions.
Whether we offer a place based on the written application alone, or after a successful interview, offer-holders will have opportunities to ask the team questions at Q&A sessions held roughly every 6 weeks from January until we fill all our places for the following academic year.
For the portfolio, less is more. Picture book writers should submit one complete work (text only is fine) and a sample or outline of a second. Chapter book and verse novelists should submit around 2,500 words. Novelists should submit 4,500 consecutive words of a work-in-progress.
It's a good idea for all applicants to provide a second short sample in addition to their main piece; ideally this would be something that shows off your range in terms of style, genre, age of audience or narrative voice. The whole portfolio should not be more than 6,000 words and should be submitted as one document; your name must be included in the file name.
Please format according to industry norms: if in doubt, look at the submission guidelines of a few UK agents.
We assess international students on the same basis as domestic students. We welcome the richness of experience that having students from many countries and backgrounds brings to the course.
In terms of English proficiency, it's important in creative writing to have sufficient grasp of nuance and connotations for meaningful discussions of, for instance, exact word choices; however, it's not a problem to need minor assistance - for example, with the odd bit of rephrasing or problems with prepositions.
If English is not your first language, you'll need to provide evidence of proficiency in the English language. We're looking for a minimum IELTS score of 6.5 with a minimum of 6.0 in each component.
It's a good idea to sign up to the free newsletters of the major trade publications in the UK, USA and any other country of particular interest to you. Keep tabs on the bestseller lists and include some works from these lists in your reading while ensuring you’re also reading as diversely as possible across genres and age groups.
Explore resources on the craft of writing (for example, Will Storr’s Science of Storytelling, John Yorke’s Into the Woods, Robert McKee’s Story, or Blake Snyder’s Save the Cat). Become familiar with the Writers' & Artists' Yearbook, including the annually-updated essays (there's also a good free blog).
Join a writing group; provide feedback to others and show them your work, then edit it with the feedback you receive. This is the best possible preparation for the workshopping that lies at the heart of our course.
Many of our postgraduate courses have a limited number of student spaces. To avoid the disappointment of the course being full, we recommend that you apply as early as possible, ideally by March of the year you'd like to start your studies.
Late applications (generally those made after 31 July) will only be considered if places remain on the course.
Need more information or still have questions? Contact us to discuss your situation.
“I particularly liked the workshops, and I think I learned a lot from my fellow students, who were very funny, welcoming and of course very gifted. It was a pleasure to work with them, and also with the tutors.”
Jim Carrington, MA Writing for Young People
Course leader: Dr Alexia Casale
Email: a.casale-katzman6@bathspa.ac.uk
We offer places on the basis of our assessment of your quality, potential and commitment as a writer and your ability to benefit from the course.
Usually, but not invariably, you'll have a degree. This may be in subjects other than Creative Writing.
This is not a beginner’s course, so we'll be looking for evidence of originality in your writing for young people, and a sense of audience.
You'll have read widely in the field of contemporary children’s literature.
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