Elon University Los Angeles summer students gather with alumni and special guests for an end-of-summer semester celebration at historic Sony Pictures Studios.
Not far from where the Yellow Brick Road began in the legendary film “The Wizard of Oz” (shot on the then-MGM lot in 1939), summer semester students gathered with LA-based alumni, LA program faculty and staff, visitors from the main campus, internship site owners and student supervisors, and industry guests for an evening celebrating the accomplishments and achievements of this summer’s cohort and recent Los Angeles alumni. The experience is a unique end-of-semester event held at Sony Pictures Studios, in Culver City, California.
For 16 years, Elon University has offered specialized, career-focused and
immersive academic programming and internship opportunities for students in domestic National Campus locations. The endeavor began with Elon University Los Angeles, under the umbrella of Study USA and the Isabella Cannon Global Education Center, in 2008.
The presentation included stand-up comedy performances by Elon visiting professor Kai Swanson’s comedy writing students Mackenzie Smith ’25 and Jesse Riback ’25, and the showcasing of comedy TikTok-style videos produced by Swanson’s comedy production students. Voice acting students showcased their achievements in a video highlighting the skills they learned in their summer course with industry professional and LA faculty member Ed Cunningham. Student Carina Kaplan ’26 curated and produced “Lens on LA,” a still image presentation that opened the event, featuring a collection of shots from Los Angeles summer events and activities, taken by Kaplan and eight other students.
Three short films produced by Los Angeles-based Elon alumni were also screened at the event in a first-time presentation of content produced by the recipients of production funds from Elon University Los Angeles. Frank Campisano ’16 (“Secret Menu Beauty Pageant”); Lauren Duncan ’18 and Alyssa Needham ’19
(“On My Time”) and Dylan Moon ’13 and Tyler Hansen ’14 (“Small Town
Psychopaths”) were on hand to experience the thrill of seeing their work presented in a screening room of a major Hollywood studio.
The gathering represented Elon University Los Angeles’s ongoing outreach to develop and nurture meaningful relationships with local community members in an effort to broaden the reach and the impact of the program and to create unique opportunities for both current and future LA-bound students and LA-based alumni.