Community Workshop Series

The Butler MFA Community Workshop series is a free writing program facilitated by Butler University alumni of the MFA in Creative Writing. These one-off workshops, hosted at partner sites including bookstores, nonprofits, and public libraries in the Greater Indianapolis area, connect adults at all stages of their writing journeys with workshop experiences shaped by graduate-level study. Thanks to a generous gift from the Efroymson Family Fund, alumni from the program’s concentrations in Poetry, Creative Nonfiction, and Fiction will guide local writers into creative practice. Each workshop is designed to help participants generate new work, learn new ways of thinking about the craft of writing, and more confidently continue their own writing practices.

Questions about the Butler MFA Community Workshop Series? Email Sam at sferrant@butler.edu. We can’t wait to hear from you!

Fall 2026 Catalog

It’s a Poem! It’s Prose! It’s Both!: A Generative Prose Poetry Workshop

Facilitator: Hannah Sullivan Brown, Class of 2020
Location: Indianapolis Public Library- Decatur | 5301 Kentucky Avenue, Indianapolis, IN 46201
Date: Tuesday, October 27 | 6:00pm- 8:00pm

Emily Dickinson famously said “If I read a book and it makes my whole body so cold no fire can warm me, I know that is poetry. If I feel physically as if the top of my head were taken off, I know that is poetry. These are the only ways I know it. Is there any other way?” This definition is helpful when considering the slippery, yet fertile, form known as prose poetry. As prose poems often do not conform to the traditional trappings of poetry, they can offer a unique way to approach our personal experiences of being in the world. In this workshop, we will engage with examples of the prose poem by contemporary poets Richard Siken, Mary Ruefle, and Claudia Rankine and see how we might use this form to generate new work of our own. We will mine our own memories and/or observations, work with prompts, and explore strategies for drafting and revising. This workshop is open to all, from the newest new to more experienced writers. 

Pens and notebooks will be provided for participants. You are also welcome to bring your own materials and/or a writing device like a laptop.

Hannah Sullivan Brown holds an MA in English from Indiana University and an MFA in Poetry from Butler University, where she also served as Poetry Editor of Booth magazine. Recent work appears in New Ohio Review, So It Goes, and Sport Literate. She lives with her family and teaches in Indianapolis.

Reconnecting to the Natural World Through Writing

Facilitator: Amy Gastelum, Class of 2025
Location: Indianapolis Public Library- Warren| 9701 E. 21st Street, Indianapolis, IN 46229
Date: Monday, November 23 | 6:00pm- 8:00pm

As animals, humans belong to the natural world, but modern life can make it hard to remember. Our bodies, made of cells and fluid, are already connected, whether we are conscious of it and can be used as tools to reconnect to the earth. This generative creative nonfiction workshop for adult writers of all levels will teach you how to use your innate senses to become aware of the natural world around you and describe it through writing. We will look at examples of nature writing, especially short prose and poetry, and use concise prompts and dynamic exercises to generate our own work.

Pens and notebooks will be provided for participants. You are also welcome to bring your own materials and/or a writing device like a laptop.

Amy Gastelum has been a public health nurse, a teacher, staff reporter for a nationally syndicated radio show, and a business owner. She’s also mom to two kids. Gastelum earned her Bachelor’s of Science in Nursing from Indiana University in 2008 and began her nursing career on the antenatal unit at the county hospital in Indianapolis. After, she continued in mother/baby care, making home visits to first-time moms in New York City and Indianapolis. In 2012, she graduated from the eight-week intensive Transom Story Workshop for radio storytelling on Cape Cod and completed her MFA in Creative Nonfiction at Butler University in 2025. As a freelancer, she has reported for PRI’s The World, NPR News, Undark, Side Effects Public Media, Guernica Magazine, and has taught at Indiana University and Butler University. Gastelum now owns an ecologically-minded garden design and consultation business, Velma Jean Flowers, named after her grandmothers. She is writing a book about pursuing self-realization through gardening.

Finding the Poem in Your Life: An Entry to Writing Poetry

Facilitator: Lydia Johnson, Class of 2015
Location: Indiana Humanities | 1500 N. Delaware St., Indianapolis, IN 46202
Date: Saturday, December 5th | 1:00pm- 3:00pm

The rhythms and changes of everyday life are shared by all of us. Through observation and reflection, the practice of poetry can create meaning and beauty from ordinary moments. In this generative poetry workshop for adults, participants will learn how to mine their experiences to create poems that focus on the common or unexamined territory of their lives. Thematic examples from contemporary poets will serve as touchpoints. Prompts and guided writing exercises will help new and experienced poets find inspiration from within.

Lydia Johnson is a poet and writer from Gary, Indiana. Her writing has been published in BLACKBERRY: a magazine, Glamour Magazine, Kiwanis Magazine and the books Women in Clothes, Writers Resist: Hoosier Writers Unite, and Belt Magazine’s The Gary Anthology. She received her M.F.A. in Creative Writing from Butler University and lives in Indianapolis, Indiana. She has taught poetry workshops and led book discussions for the Indiana Writers Center, Indiana Humanities, and other local nonprofits. She volunteers as an Editorial Assistant for The Indianapolis Review and serves as a judge for various writing contests geared toward young writers.

Pens and notebooks will be provided for participants. You are also welcome to bring your own materials and/or a writing device like a laptop.

Directing Your Fiction: An Introductory Writing Workshop

Facilitator: Elisabeth Giffin Speckman, Class of 2016
Location: Indianapolis Public Library- Pike | 6525 Zionsville Road, Indianapolis, IN 46268
Date: Monday, December 14 | 2:00pm- 4:00pm

Do you have a story inside of you that you’re unsure how to tell? Maybe you have a general picture, but the details are hazy. Maybe you have all of the details down, but you aren’t sure how to frame it. Or maybe you’ve got too much and you need help knowing what to leave on the cutting room floor. The good news is: you’re already a storyteller, regardless of whether you’ve written a word. The better news: you’ll leave this workshop as a writer. This free generative fiction workshop for adult writers of all levels will teach you how to apply cinematography techniques to your prose writing to help zoom in and focus on what matters most, heighten tension, and reveal character. We will look at and discuss examples of how these techniques are applied in sample excerpts and engage in activities to apply these techniques to our own writing. Participants will leave this workshop with a new toolkit for enhancing and improving their fiction, as well as some freshly generated work.

Pens and notebooks will be provided for participants. You are also welcome to bring your own materials and/or a writing device like a laptop.

Elisabeth Giffin Speckman (she/her) received her MFA in Fiction from Butler University. She has taught undergraduate courses in first year studies, prose, academic writing, screenwriting, media literacy, and acting, as well as various youth and community workshops and classes in creative writing and drama. Elisabeth writes in multiple genres. Her plays include Clyt; or, The Bathtub Play (O’Neill Finalist 2023; Henley Rose Finalist) and Catch/Release (Henley Rose Finalist) and have been produced throughout the United States and five other countries. She has developed work with the Yale Writers’ Conference (now Yale Writers’ Workshop), the Kennedy Center Playwriting Intensive, 29th Street Playwrights Collective, The Bechdel Group, The Skeleton Rep(resents), and The Barrow Group, and has studied comedy and sketch writing with Upright Citizens Brigade, Bad Medicine Comedy, and The Second City. Her plays are available via Next Stage Press, YouthPLAYS, and the New Play Exchange, among others. Her short screenplays have been selected, nominated, and awarded in national and international film festivals. Poetry, prose, and photography appears or is forthcoming in trampset, Harrow House, Pink Ochre Literary Magazine, Midwestern Gothic, Flash Fiction Magazine, CHEAP POP, Three Line Poetry, and Pidgeonholes, among others. More info at her woefully out of date website egspeckman.com.

Writing Short Stories From Your Life and Times: A Fiction Workshop

Facilitator: Jennifer Delgadillo, Class of 2024
Location: Indianapolis Public Library- Fort Ben | 9330 East 56th Street Indianapolis, IN 46216
Date: Tuesday, December 15th | 6:00pm- 8:00pm

In her famous hit If I Could Turn Back Time, pop superstar Cher sings that she would take back the hurtful things she said to make her lover stay. What would you do if you could tell a story your way? This generative fiction workshop for adult writers of all levels will teach you how to take creative liberties with your own life to change events, merge people or invent scenes. In this class, a good story is more important than the facts! We will look at examples from short fiction and excerpts from novels, and use prompts and dynamic exercises to generate our own writing.

Pens and notebooks will be provided for participants. You are also welcome to bring your own materials and/or a writing device like a laptop.

Jennifer Delgadillo is a writer and artist from Mexico. She lives in Indianapolis where she is the arts & culture editor at local news non-profit Mirror Indy. She has an MFA in creative writing, fiction, from Butler University and a BFA in painting from Herron School of Art and Design. Her work has been published in The Massachusetts Review, Narrative, Indiana Review, and elsewhere.

Finding the Small Details to Start Writing Creative Nonfiction: A Workshop

Facilitator: Bek Primrose, Class of 2023
Location: Golden Hour Books | 5208 N College Ave, Indianapolis, IN 46220
Date: Wednesday, January 6th, 2027 | 7:15pm – 9:00pm

Writing true stories from our lives can be daunting, overwhelming even. Like everything else in life, writing meaningful true stories is a skill that we can develop and work out over time like a muscle. This generative creative nonfiction workshop for adult writers of all levels will teach you how to mine the small details of your life, recognize images and language that are meaningful to you (and thus other readers!), and use those tiny pieces to write work that you are proud of. We will look at examples of writing that centers the small details of people’s lives and use concise prompts and dynamic exercises to generate our own writing. Our goal is that you leave this workshop more confident with where to begin in your own writing practice!

Pens and notebooks will be provided for participants. You are also welcome to bring your own materials and/or a writing device like a laptop.

Bek Primrose bio coming soon.

Sam Ferrante
Butler MFA Community Workshop Director

Sam Ferrante (she/her) is a queer poet, teacher, and busybody who received her MFA in Creative Writing from Butler University in 2020 and now serves as the Butler MFA Community Workshop Director. A former member of the Pure Ink Poetry team in Buffalo, Sam has served as a Poetry Editor for Booth, a Creative Producer for Slamalamadingdong, a Melbourne Spoken Word board member, and was the founding facilitator of the Melbourne Spoken Word Workshops. Her manuscript, No More Odes to My Mouth, won the 2020 First-Book Scholarship from Gasher Journal. Sam’s written work has appeared or is forthcoming in The MacGuffin, Hobart After Dark, Turnpike, Foundlings, Ghost City Review, Hypertext Review, and elsewhere. She is currently the Director of Development for Sonic Poetry Festival, an annual grassroots spoken word and poetry festival based in Naarm/Melbourne. Sam also hosts Real Life, Revised, a reading series and open mic, on the second Sunday of each month at Indiana Humanities. Follow Real Life, Revised on Instagram @RealLife_Revised.