Minor Portfolio

Note: This set of requirements applies to students who declare a minor in English and Creative Writing prior to the 2026-27 academic year. 

Legacy Creative Writing Minors may complete an optional portfolio in their chosen genre: poetry, fiction, or nonfiction. The portfolio is not a BA thesis but represents a body of work that students have either worked on in a past workshop or developed in their graduating year. Students in the minor can craft their writing portfolios in a Thesis/Major Projects Workshop under the guidance of a faculty advisor. Students opting into the minor portfolio will turn them in at the end of winter quarter to their thesis workshop instructor, the Student Affairs Administrator, and Professor Ryan Van Meter, the Faculty Minor Liaison

Thesis Workshops are only offered during Winter Quarter and provide the opportunity for students in the minor to work alongside majors and MAPH students. CRWR minors may enroll in one of the following courses to fulfill an elective credit for the minor: CRWR 29200 Thesis Workshop in Fiction, CRWR 29300 Thesis Workshop in Poetry, CRWR 29400 Thesis Workshop in Literary Nonfiction, CRWR 29500 Thesis Workshop in Prose (Fiction and Literary Nonfiction)

Below are the Program's current formatting guidelines for the portfolio. Students may submit their portfolios to their faculty advisors, the Student Affairs Administrator, and Professor Ryan Van Meter, Faculty Minor Liaison, by the end of their Winter Thesis Workshop. The current academic year deadline is Friday, March 13, 2026.

• Portfolios should be typed, double-spaced (except for poetry), and contain page numbers
• Portfolios should include a title that indicates that this is a minor portfolio
• Portfolios should include your name on the document
• If you are including more than one piece, please include a brief table of contents
• Content: For fiction: 1-2 short stories or an excerpt from a longer work; for nonfiction: 1-2 essays or an excerpt from a longer work; for poetry: 10-15 poems depending on length
• Page limits: refer to the guidelines discussed in your Thesis/Major Projects Workshop for page limits, but please do not exceed 20-25 pages if you are writing prose
• You are invited to include a brief statement explaining how you put together your portfolio (e.g. “X is an essay that I began in my Fundamentals class in my second year, but have refined in this way…”)
• For all minor portfolios, editing and polishing are essential; please make sure that you have proofread your work and that the pieces you turn in are the result of thorough revisions
• The final draft of the portfolio should be submitted as a pdf
• A cover page is required for your portfolio; formatting requirements can be found at the link below