MFA in Screenwriting

Our small, select program offers the necessary time and focuses to hone your skills for both film and television. Ready to join our Writer's Room?

No GRE Required.

The Boston University Master of Fine Arts in Screenwriting offers the best of both worlds: a learning environment on the east coast and a working-world experience on the west coast.

Over four semesters in two cities, students build the skills, experience, and community to launch a career in the television and film industry as a scriptwriter. They start with three semesters in Boston and become part of a close-knit community that wants to grow together. COM keeps things intimate and nurturing by design, so students collaborate and learn from peers as well as faculty.

Then, students spend their fourth semester in Los Angeles, learning through an industry internship and gaining valuable experience from established writers and guest presenters while networking with our Los Angeles-based alumni. All students take a rewrite class to revise and polish a script started in Boston.

Students will write a minimum of seven scripts for:

• Two feature-length screenplays
• Two short screenplays
• An existing hour-long TV drama
• An existing half-hour TV comedy
• An original TV pilot and series bible

Courses cover writing for television (including Writing the Pilot, Writing the Sitcom, and Writing the Episodic Drama, among them) as well as for film (Writing the Short Film, Script into Film, three feature screenwriting workshops).

Learn Alongside Professionals

Students are mentored and taught by industry-savvy faculty -- veteran creatives who earned their stripes writing for both film and television. COM’s screenwriting faculty share their own experiences in the craft as well as their insights into building a professional network.

Since the MFA in Screenwriting is known as a “terminal degree,” students may gain teaching experience while also earning a paycheck through a graduate assistant position. After teaching their own section of our undergraduate screenwriting course, our MFA students have gone on to adjunct and full-time teaching positions.

Purpose Driven

It may be COM’s shared values that matter most. We believe that communication requires diversity, critical thinking, and creative expression. We believe that communication must be grounded in truth, authenticity, effectiveness, and purpose. We believe that communication builds understanding among people and across society.

Communicate for understanding

Do you love films and television? Social media? News? Telling stories? Changing minds—and maybe history? Boston University College of Communication (COM) is for you.

We’ve been educating professional communicators since we offered the world’s first degree in public relations in 1947 and the first master’s and Ph.D. degrees in emerging media studies in 2015. Today, our alumni occupy the highest levels in a multitude of fields. Tomorrow? We’re training the next generation of leaders in advertising, emerging media, film, and television, journalism, media science, and public relations.

We do this because COM students, faculty, and alumni share a simple but powerful belief: communication builds understanding — among people and throughout society.

Storytelling Skills for Career Success

If you’re a student here, you’ll gain the skills, knowledge, and opportunities to turn your love of communication and storytelling into a successful career. You’ll gain a deep understanding of the many forms of media. You’ll become proficient in writing, speaking, visual communication, and digital media skills. All combined with a solid grounding in the liberal arts hone your mind and free your imagination. And you will gain practical, real-world, hands-on experience outside the classroom through our extensive internship programs and COM activities such as AdLab, PRLab, PRSSA, WTBU, BUTV10, BU News Service, Hothouse Productions, and the Daily Free Press.

Yes, our faculty teach — but also they also do. They include best-selling authors and Pulitzer-winning journalists. Others are internationally recognized thinkers and researchers in the fields of emerging media, technology, and misinformation. And others have written and directed movies and series for every major broadcast network and HBO, as well as for films and documentaries screened at film festivals around the world.

COM alumni have won numerous prizes, awards, and citations from Pulitzer to Emmy to Clio. Among them are CEOs, Hollywood directors and screenwriters, stars in television and radio, and White House staffers. In fact, our graduates sit at the top of major companies in all areas of communication. They include Bonnie Hammer, vice chairman at NBCUniversal; David Lubars, chairman/chief creative officer of BBDO; Nancy Dubuc, CEO of VICE; and Kevin Merida, executive editor of the Los Angeles Times. In all, COM has more than 30,000 alumni worldwide with far-reaching connections in every area of communication and beyond.

Our Mission

We build understanding through communication education, practice, and discovery.

We prepare students to lead, adapt, and share their voices in a transformational media world.

We generate knowledge through research and theory-building.

We integrate professional and academic experiences across communication disciplines.

We nurture a culture rich in diversity, critical thinking, and creative expression.

We champion communication grounded in truth, authenticity, effectiveness, and purpose.

Diversity, Equity & Inclusion

The College of Communication Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Committee exists to elevate and ensure a culture of inclusion in which all members of our community are valued and respected. We strive to create an inclusive and equitable environment that recruits, supports, and retains a diverse community of students, faculty, and staff. We celebrate the diversity of identity, culture, perspective, and expression in our community. As professional communicators, we have a responsibility to:

Foster an environment that cultivates diverse storytellers, Promote the value of research and telling stories in academia and the various fields of professional communication that emphasize diversity, equity, and inclusion, and; Inform, enlighten, and prepare the next generation of communicators to thrive in a diverse and inclusive world.