Course details

Summary

Unlock your imagination

Unlock your imagination, expand your thinking and polish your writing with Massey’s BA (Creative Writing).

What is it Like?

Inspiration, communication and vocation are at the heart of Massey’s exciting BA (Creative Writing). It offers you the chance to develop your writing so that it’s pitch-perfect for a variety of audiences. You’ll enhance your critical thinking and master a wide range of transferrable communication skills while pursuing your own creative vision.

Choose your canvas

Creative writing offers you flexibility in writing original work in a variety of genres: learn to write fiction, scripts for the stage and screen, poetry, creative non-fiction, life writing and travel writing.

Learn from published authors

Our award-winning teachers are also internationally acclaimed writers who teach from their own first-hand experience in moving from idea to page, polishing their work and sending it off to be published or performed.

Get real

Your third year has a vocational focus: you’ll produce a working manuscript of your own writing. You also have the opportunity to gain hands-on editing and publishing experience or facilitate a creative writing arts project in your local community.

Get published

Students who have taken our creative writing courses have gone on to publish poems, stories, essays and books as well as winning some of New Zealand’s top writing prizes.

Careers

A Bachelor of Arts (Creative Writing) is one of the most creative and enriching degrees you can do. Employers seek out BA students for their lateral and analytical thinking, communication skills and creative ability.

There are various possibilities for creative writing graduates, including:

• Writing for television, magazines, blogs or the book-publishing industry
• Corporate or non-profit freelance writing
• Creative arts project coordination
• Inter-arts collaboration for arts festivals
• Writing for public relations
• Creative writing in advertising
• Teaching
• Performance-related writing and production
• Writing and advising on Government policy
• Writing for social media

Majoring Requirements

A major consists of 135 credits in Creative Writing, including 139.123, 139.280, and 139.380; 15 credits at 200-level; 45 credits at 300-level, and 30 credits at any level from the Creative Writing schedule.

Entry criteria

Students must have successful completion of a qualification equivalent to the New Zealand Year 13 - NCEA Level 3 University Entrance.

English Language Requirements:

• IELTS score of 6.0 (no band less than 5.5)
• TOEFL iBT score of 80 overall (min 19 in Writing)
• PTE Academic score of 50 Overall (min 42 in communicative skills)
• Cambridge English score of 170