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Job outlook for creative writing english professors in the United States
Are creative writing english professor jobs in demand?
Creative writing english professor job and salary trends over time
Creative writing english professor jobs over time
Creative writing english professor job growth rate over time
| Year | # of jobs | % of population |
|---|---|---|
| 2021 | 38 | 0.00% |
| 2020 | 43 | 0.00% |
| 2019 | 45 | 0.00% |
| 2018 | 45 | 0.00% |
| 2017 | 45 | 0.00% |
Average creative writing english professor salary over time
Creative writing english professor salary by year
| Year | Avg. salary | Hourly rate | % Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2025 | $69,822 | $33.57 | +0.7% |
| 2024 | $69,306 | $33.32 | +2.9% |
| 2023 | $67,383 | $32.40 | +2.6% |
| 2022 | $65,683 | $31.58 | +1.9% |
| 2021 | $64,489 | $31.00 | +2.8% |
Creative writing english professor jobs by state
Most common states for creative writing english professors
| Rank | State | Population | # of jobs | Employment/ 1000ppl |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | District of Columbia | 693,972 | 93 | 13% |
| 2 | Vermont | 623,657 | 74 | 12% |
| 3 | South Dakota | 869,666 | 66 | 8% |
| 4 | West Virginia | 1,815,857 | 121 | 7% |
| 5 | Alaska | 739,795 | 51 | 7% |
| 6 | Virginia | 8,470,020 | 473 | 6% |
| 7 | Colorado | 5,607,154 | 350 | 6% |
| 8 | Oregon | 4,142,776 | 260 | 6% |
| 9 | Utah | 3,101,833 | 176 | 6% |
| 10 | Nebraska | 1,920,076 | 116 | 6% |
| 11 | Rhode Island | 1,059,639 | 62 | 6% |
| 12 | Wyoming | 579,315 | 32 | 6% |
| 13 | New York | 19,849,399 | 1,058 | 5% |
| 14 | Mississippi | 2,984,100 | 148 | 5% |
| 15 | Maine | 1,335,907 | 66 | 5% |
| 16 | Montana | 1,050,493 | 56 | 5% |
| 17 | Pennsylvania | 12,805,537 | 499 | 4% |
| 18 | Louisiana | 4,684,333 | 178 | 4% |
| 19 | Delaware | 961,939 | 41 | 4% |
| 20 | North Dakota | 755,393 | 30 | 4% |
Creative Writing English Professor job outlook: Expert opinions
Our panel of creative writing english professor experts
University of Oregon
Kean University
University of Arizona
California University of Pennsylvania
Mary Wood
Professor of EnglishUniversity of Oregon
English Language And Literature
What will help Creative Writing English Professors increase their earning potential?
Mary Wood: Dislike: Administrative meetings, Grading papers, Bureaucratic paperwork, Lack of robust funding for research and teaching. Like: Working with students, Talking, writing, and reading about literature and getting paid for it, My co-workers and their commitment to their students, Having flexibility in my workday (available to college teachers, not K-12)
What general advice would you give to a Creative Writing English Professor?
Dr. Lisa Sisler D.Litt, MFA: Regardless of the level the educator is at (high school/ college), most of the day is spent in the classroom teaching. There is prep for each class: lesson planning, reading, researching. Then there is the grading of papers. We also spend a lot of time mentoring and advising students, working one-on-one with students to help them achieve both class goals and their personal goals.
What Creative Writing English Professor skills would you recommend for someone trying to advance their career?
Dr. Lisa Sisler D.Litt, MFA: After Covid, many teachers left the profession so the profession needs teachers. As well, with a return to in-person learning we have noticed significant gaps in learning. And with the emergence of AI Writing tools, a strong foundation in reading and writing is critical.
What will help Creative Writing English Professors increase their earning potential?
Dr. Lisa Sisler D.Litt, MFA: I would say, personally, the best part of being an English educator is being in the classroom, working with the students. There's a kind of magic that happens in that space-- a shared space of ideas and literature and writing-- nothing beats that. The hardest part about being an English educator is the grading-- finding the time to get it done is often difficult, especially with all the meetings and other responsibilities that pile up throughout the semester. Though reading the students' work is often enlightening and gratifying.
What general advice would you give to a Creative Writing English Professor?
Dr. Dennis Wise Professor Practice: It's an extremely challenging moment to be entering the profession. Since 2008, state legislatures have been cutting back funding for higher education, and that has hurt English Departments because courses that require writing instruction (as our do) can't be run at ultra-large, 200-students a class levels. That has limited the willingness of administrations to hire tenure-track faculty, and has contributed to a proliferation of contingent (or year-to-year) labor. In addition, graduate programs across the country tend to significantly over-produce doctoral students, graduating far more each year than the job market can handle. All this goes to make the job prospects of anyone fresh out of graduate school relatively bleak. Many are forced into adjuncting, more and more of the former professoriate are becoming adjuncts.
What Creative Writing English Professor skills would you recommend for someone trying to advance their career?
Dr. Dennis Wise Professor Practice: The major benefit of the profession is flexibility of hours. Even for someone contracted for 40 hours a week of teaching, only about 12-15 of those hours are spent in the classroom – the grading and lesson prepping one can do anytime, anywhere. Likewise, working with the students is often increasingly rewarding. At the same time, burn-out from overwork and increasingly poor labor conditions is increasingly common, and our profession receives very poor compensation given the level of education professors are required to have.
What will help Creative Writing English Professors increase their earning potential?
Dr. Dennis Wise Professor Practice: The basic requirements on the profession are teaching, research, and service (whether service to the department, the university, or the field), in that order, but also job duties depend on the type of institution. In community colleges, your focus is almost exclusively on teaching, and at research universities, tenure-track faculty often have 40/40/20 workloads (i.e., 40% teaching, 40% research, and 20% service). However, even within institutions, there are different ranks of professors. at my institution, tenure-track faculty have the 40/40/20 workload that I described, but career-track faculty generally have a 80/20 workload – 80% teaching, 20% service. Below this rank are adjuncts. Adjuncts are paid on a per-course basis, and they're roughly equivalent to minimum wage McDonald's workers despite the quality of teaching work they do. They are not benefits eligible. Teaching encompasses not only classroom time, which is actually only a small proportion of the job, but class prep, office hours, conferencing with students, and grading (especially grading). It's also common to keep up with professional trainings. Research in an English Department requires that you publish with peer-reviewed journals and publish books with university presses. It also includes presenting at conferences. Service can encompass anything from serving on committees, directing thesis students, working in academic publishing (which is unpaid), and anything else.
What type of skills will young Creative Writing English Professors need?
Dr. Christina Fisanick: College graduates in 2021 and beyond need all of the skills that English programs have to offer: critical thinking, effective communication, creativity, and flexibility. New hires need to be able to adapt to workplace changes quickly and with aplomb, which requires critical thinking and problem solving and the ability to communicate those solutions to a diverse audience clearly and effectively. Those skills are refined and practiced regularly in English programs.
Are there any particularly good places in the United States for Creative Writing English Professors to find work opportunities?
Dr. Christina Fisanick: Although employers prior to COVID-19 knew that remote work was not only possible, but in some cases even more productive than in the traditional workplace, the pandemic has reinforced the idea that employees can work from anywhere in the world. While this gives graduates the potential to work globally in a way that was never possible before, it also means that English majors in the US are now competing in a worldwide marketplace against graduates from universities not just in their region or country, but from around the globe. It is both exciting and intimidating, and we must prepare our graduates to meet the demands of this ever-expanding job market.
How do you envision technology impacting Creative Writing English Professors in the next 5 years?
Dr. Christina Fisanick: Given that English majors are placed in a broad range of fields after graduation, it is difficult to identify which specific technologies will be used most, which is why critical thinking and adaptability are key skills. I can imagine that editing and word processing software will remain in heavy use by our graduates in the workplace, along with social media and other communication applications. Exposing students to the many possibilities of how technology changes the production and consumption of texts is vital to what English programs do best.