What does it take to make it in show business? A new internship program at Elon brings students to Los Angeles for a summer course that includes meetings with industry executives, lessons on marketing ideas – and a presentation to Hollywood executives of their own group proposal for a TV or movie production.
“Not only do you need a great idea with the creativity and artistic skills, you need to be able to sell and pitch that idea, to show there’s a market out there and that there are advertisers,” said J. McMerty, a staff member in the School of Communications who is leading the program. “It’s seeing the logistics of the whole thing. The main goal is for students to have a positive experience with both the class and the internships.”
While many of the students planning to participate are enrolled in the School of Communications, the program was open to the entire undergraduate body. In fact, McMerty said, a performing arts student and a business student are among those who will travel to Los Angeles come May.
The Elon program is modeled off similar projects already in place at Ithaca College and the University of Texas. But because Elon has no permanent facility or staff on the West Coast, the program – at $5,800 – costs students only a fraction of what they were paying for similar classes at the other institutions.
“Most of our students live on the East Coast, so a West Coast internship is particularly appealing,” said Paul Parsons, dean of the School of Communications. “Los Angeles is the place to be, since it’s the capital of media entertainment such as television and the film industry.”
Officials said that they hope to eventually expand the Los Angeles program into a semester experience.
Students stay in a Burbank apartment complex and currently have access to data that gives them contact information for studios, talent agencies and other internship opportunities.
“I love the whole field but don’t know what sector I want to go into,” said Kelly Murtagh, a junior broadcast journalism major who is taking part in the program. “I feel like it’s better to explore the option right now as opposed to when I do graduate, move out there and figure out it isn’t for me.”
The students will meet every Monday at a different location around Los Angeles, seeing firsthand how the business operates, and they work Tuesday through Friday at internships they are now in the process of seeking.
“I think that’s what so amazing about Elon,” Murtagh said. “It is such a hands on-community, and we’re able to do these sorts of things.”