>>10
I just finished my degree in English with that concentration.

LET ME GIVE YOU GUYS A LITTLE INSIDE INFORMATION, BURIED WITHIN THIS WALL OF TEXT:

Creative writing is a waste of time.

If you're interested in writing, take composition and literature courses. I learned more about writing in one course on Modernism than I did in working my way up to "English 496 Advanced Fiction Workshop." You will learn more from canonized writers who give useful insight into literary composition than you will reading some short stories or poetry and trying to imitate it.

IMPORTANT POINT: All, and I mean ALL of my creative writing courses were mainly based upon peer review. This amounted to mostly the blind leading the blind, heavily sycophantic behavior from the peers, and professors who were too afraid to give honest criticism. Good taste and a hint of genius cannot be taught, and there are far better methods of refining whatever talents you may have.

I had considered, for a time, going to graduate school and getting an MFA in creative writing. Here are some reasons why, if I do decide to look at graduate schools, I would go for something along the lines of composition/rhetoric instead:

A) You're going to go to a college and pay a bunch of money with the hope that someone might provide a useful critique of your work. If you decide to pursue graduate school for an MFA in creative writing, you'll be processed through, pointed to some publishers, lose about 50,000 dollars, and end up with a degree which will allow few options outside of teaching.

B) Every man, woman, and their dog wants to write a book these days because, guess what, they can. Maybe it's the internet, maybe it's because modern man has more free time...who knows. What advantage will you have over them? You got to find some people to whom you were able to show off your "work"?

C) There are other English degrees which have commercial viability (e.g. job opportunities) that will still allow you to develop your skills as a writer. Technical/professional writing, composition, and web-related masters programs (and maybe undergrad, depending on where you are) all will land you a decent job that won't consume all of your time, allowing you to pursue something a bit more meaningful than helping other people get rich.

Good writing is the product of life experience and the ability to articulate the emotion and vividness of memory and imagination. It is not the product of hours upon hours sitting in classrooms with books shoved up your ass and professors spouting so much shit that you couldn't stay above it if you had a helicopter. You can work like a fiend and end up in a school where the academics do a good job of bullshitting you, or you can go to a mediocre school where people are too lazy to cover it up.