Its faculty includes Pulitzer Prize finalists, National Book Award winners, Newbery Medal honorees, Guggenheim Fellowship and Fulbright Program fellows, and Ford Foundation grant recipients.

In January 2024, media reported that the college was looking for a long-term partner who could provide a home for the two annual 9-day residencies that are part of all of VCFA's academic programs.

Artists- and writers-in-residence have included Jean Valentine, Richard Russo, Claudia Emerson, M. T. Anderson, Andrew Blauvelt, Susan Cooper, Meredith Davis, Gregory Maguire, Holly Black, Jane Yolen, Wu Tsang, and Stephen Drury.

In the low-residency structure, students earn their graduate degrees through brief, on-campus residencies, self-designated study, flexible scheduling, and personalized attention through one-on-one guidance with a faculty mentor.

The on-campus residencies consist of workshops, lectures, readings, panel discussions, student-teacher conferences and critiques, and presentations of works in progress.