You want to be a better writer and develop your literary skills. You want to advance your career by improving your professional editorial skills. You love literature. These are all good reasons to pursue an online degree in writing.
If you're interested in writing, find a school that teaches the craft. There are journalism schools, and schools with their own undergraduate writing programs. Some schools offer a major in English, ... with a concentration in English literature or creative writing
An online writing undergraduate student learns about all kinds of writing: poetry, fiction, creative writing, creative nonfiction, playwriting, and new media. You'll read the work of great writers, and be exposed to the variety of styles.
And you'll write — a lot — in all genres. As an undergraduate in an online writing program, you'll try your hand at horror, science fiction, mystery, comedy and suspense, and workshop the results with feedback from your fellow students. Your articles, short stories, poems, and essays may appear online or in print. You'll write novels, essays, short stories and poetry, history pieces, travel articles, science, and nature stories, and yes, the ubiquitous memoir.
Writing workshops and feedback from professors and other students will improve your writing skills, and toughen your skin for the competitive field of professional writing.
By studying for an online undergraduate degree in writing, you'll take courses in critical analysis, translation, narrative structure, character development, and plot. If you're not a creative writer, specialty courses in technical writing, science writing and digital media may take you down a different road. If you're interested in entertainment writing, look for courses in scriptwriting, story development, storyboarding, comics and animation, visual thinking, and symbolic communications.
Where can an online undergraduate writing degree take you? Publishing and journalism are obvious destinations. So is the entertainment field, which needs creative writers for movies, television, websites, games, and mobile devices.
Others take their online writing degrees to the business arena, working in fields such as science, law, pharmaceuticals, insurance, information services, or education. And all companies, large and small, need editors and writers to create content for their websites, and to work on their in-house and online publications.