Adam Morgan, a second-year student in Roosevelt University’s Master of Fine Arts (MFA) in Creative Writing Program, has won $25,000 and the opportunity to have his award-winning comedy script, Liberal Arts, produced as a national network TV pilot by Fox Broadcasting Co.

Selected as the winner over more than 600 entries, Morgan’s TV script follows a college freshman’s first experiences at a small, private, liberal arts college. The Roosevelt student took highest honor in the Fox-Procter and Gamble Comedy Script Contest during the 2009 New York Television Festival Awards held in New York City on Saturday, Sept. 26.

"I’m thrilled that my script was selected, but it still hasn’t sunk in yet — not only that I won, but that a broadcast network like Fox is looking to cast my script as a television show," said Morgan, who first came up with the idea of creating a TV show about crazy, awkward college experiences in 2007 shortly after graduating himself from a small liberal arts college in the South.

"Every college has its own mythology and rites of passage, and I just thought it would be a great minefield for story ideas and a great setting for a comedy show," said Morgan, who wrote his winning, 35-page script over the course of a week early last summer.

Morgan’s Liberal Arts tells the story of what it’s like to be a college student through the eyes of Zach Croft, a well-meaning but shy and unlucky guy who tries but usually doesn’t succeed in making a good impression at homecoming, parents’ weekend, campus parties and other college settings.

Morgan, who is concentrating on fiction writing in the Creative Writing Program at Roosevelt, where he also has taken a screenwriting class, wasn’t planning on attending the awards ceremony, but decided to go when one of the organizers from the New York Television Festival Awards phoned him and encouraged him to come.

"I knew I was one of 25 finalists, but I didn’t know I was going to win," said Morgan, who first learned he w on as he sat in the audience during the awards ceremony.

"It was a surreal experience," said Morgan. "I was thrilled and surprised, but happy and content that I could have this kind of measurable success because as a writer you don’t often get that. You just kind of write for yourself," he said.

Morgan credits his Roosevelt experience and the Creative Writing Program with teaching him how to do effective storytelling through well-developed characters.

"I’m a much better writer after a year at Roosevelt than I was when I came up with the idea," said Morgan. "I don’t think I would have won this contest if I’d pursued the idea when I first came up with it. The Creative Writing Program at Roosevelt has made me a much better storyteller."

"This is a huge, life-changing event for Adam," added Scott Blackwood, director of the Creative Writing Program at Roosevelt University. "It will allow him to pursue the kind of writing he loves most."

Morgan, who is a graduate assistant in Roosevelt’s Creative Writing Program, has written for Publisher’s Weekly, Bookslut and Fringe Television. He also is the editor in chief of Roosevelt’s literary journal, Oyez Review, is in charge of Roosevelt’s MFA Blog at http://rumfa.blogspot.com and has his own blog as well at www.mounthelicon.blogspot.com.

He will be meeting with representatives of Fox and Procter and Gamble in coming weeks to discuss plans for a TV pilot, and hopes to be involved in writing episodes for a TV show as the project moves along. Currently, Morgan is among 54 students from all over the country who are enrolled in Roosevelt’s Creative Writing Program, which has doubled in size and has had record-setting entry classes during the last several years. The program offers concentrations in fiction, poetry and creative non-fiction, and also requires writers to practice those genres as well as screenwriting and playwriting.

"This award will help to bring attention to the different kinds of writers we have attracted into the program," said Blackwood. "It’s also a huge boost for all of the writers in our program who can see what can be achieved with hard work, patience and perseverance."

Morgan grew up in North and South Carolina, and currently resides in Chicago’s Lakeview neighborhood.