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USC Annenberg Media, Los Angeles, CA (2025)

08/07/2025

The namesake for the USC Glorya Kaufman School of Dance has died at 95.

Kaufman is most known for shaping the careers of young dancers. As a lifelong champion of dance she spent her lifetime donating to nonprofit organizations and preserving dance institutions in L.A.

Her grant in 2012 led to the founding of the Kaufman School of Dance. That same year she became a member of the Board of Trustees. Kaufman also donated $18 million to help UCLA renovate their dance building in 1999.

She wanted for dance to be accessible and was committed to helping less advantaged students gain access to programs in their communities. Through an endowment at Inner-City Arts in East L.A., she allowed thousands of kids access to take free dance classes each year.

Read more at the link in bio

✍️ Aditya Thiyag
📸 USC Photo/Greg Grudt

08/05/2025

Headed back to campus soon? Feel free to leave your ID at home. Starting today, IDs will no longer be checked at campus entrances between 6 a.m. and 9 p.m.

After more than a year of enhanced security measures around campus and 24/7 ID checks, campus will re-open to the public for daytime entry, no prior registration necessary. IDs are still required from 9 p.m. to 6 a.m., and all 11 campus entrances will remain staffed by security personnel.

Interim President Beong-Soo Kim said he wanted the campus to be “freer” to the surrounding community — but maintain the ability to quickly restore ID checks if deemed necessary.

“We’re going to have the security personnel at the entrances making sure that all of our rules are being followed,” Kim said in an interview with Annenberg Media. “We’re going to retain much of the physical infrastructure that we have so that if it’s needed for any reason, we can very quickly close the campus or require ID checks on a temporary basis.”

USC first instated ID checks and other security policies including bag checks, limited entrances, required visitor registration and metal fencing around campus during the pro-Palestinian encampment protests in April 2024. Nearly all have since been removed.

USC would not comment on how much these increased security measures cost. However, Kim emphasized the safety of the campus remains the No. 1 priority.

Read more at the link in bio.

✍️ Shruthi Narayanan
📸 Kate Stuzin

07/28/2025

Wallis Annenberg, president and CEO of the Annenberg Foundation, died Monday morning after a battle with lung cancer. The 86-year-old heiress to Walter Annenberg’s publishing empire dedicated her life to shaping Los Angeles with generous donations to various museums, universities and animal welfare causes.

USC’s Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism was originally founded by Wallis’s father in 1971. In 2011, Wallis donated $50 million to build Wallis Annenberg Hall, one of the school’s main buildings and the home of the Annenberg Media Center.

Wallis’s philanthropic impact is widespread across L.A. With her fortune, she established the Wallis Annenberg Building at the California Science Center in Exposition Park, the Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts in Beverly Hills, the Wallis Annenberg Community Beach House and the upcoming Wallis Annenberg Wildlife Crossing in Agoura Hills.

In a statement to Annenberg Media, Dean Willow Bay said: “Courageous, thoughtful and exceedingly generous Wallis Annenberg was our champion, a lifelong advocate for the essential role communication and journalism play in advancing our society and sustaining our democracy. Every time I step into Annenberg Hall, I feel the power of her generous and trailblazing philanthropy, which has advanced an enduring mission of innovation and service to the world around us. Her legacy carries on in the many lives she touched and communities she nurtured. We are heartbroken by her passing and we will do our best to continue to make her proud.”

Wallis was awarded a National Humanities Medal by the White House in 2022 for her philanthropic work.

✍ Malcolm Caminero
📸 W***y Sanjuan/Invision/AP

07/14/2025

USC’s increasing operating deficit has led to action being taken to reduce expenses in the form of layoffs, hiring freezes and eliminating merit-based pay raises, President Beong-Soo Kim said in a statement this morning.

Kim said this action was taken because of the Trump administration’s proposed budget cuts to university research funds across the country and a projected decrease in student enrollment, which could lead to an annual revenue loss of $300 million in federally sponsored research funding. He further stated that USC’s “recurring, structural deficit erodes cash reserves, constrains future planning and capital needs, and is simply unsustainable.”

The statement also said USC took action within the last year to reduce their expenses by reducing school budgets and pausing hiring, but the university still ended the 2025 fiscal year with an operating deficit of $200 million, compared to the $158 million deficit in 2024.

To combat this, Kim said there would be no “zero-merit increases” in the 2026 fiscal year, meaning faculty would not see pay increases after performance reviews. Furthermore, Kim said that to resolve these financial issues, the university would sell unused properties and adjust “compensation for the most highly compensated members of our community.”

Kim closed out the statement by talking about USC’s core values, and stating that his goal is to create a sustainable plan of action and “prioritize and protect” the university’s core mission of maintaining a “broad array of academic, professional, extracurricular and athletic programs of the first rank.”

USC is taking financial suggestions from the Trojan community in the form of a virtual suggestion box. At the time of publishing, this website is still under development, but suggestions can still be made using a form on USC's website.

This is a developing story.

07/13/2025

Abdulla, 22, was driving through Bahrain on Saturday with a car full of friends when he realized his GPS had set his location to Israel. He input directions to a popular local mall into Google Maps only to find that it was 21 hours away instead of the usual 15 minutes.

“I was shocked,” Abdulla said. “My initial reaction was I couldn’t believe what was going on.”

His location, from his Snap Map to his Find My Phone, showed him to be in the heart of Tel Aviv. His map continued to show him in Israel for about five minutes before returning to normal.

Just hours later, the U.S. launched an airstrike on three of Iran’s nuclear bases, causing government offices and airspaces across the region to shut down.

Bahrain, an island country in the Persian Gulf that lies just between Iran and Israel, has been on high alert since tensions between the two countries escalated, but has not become involved in any conflict.

As tensions rise across the Middle East, many citizens are experiencing a spike in incorrect locations on their phone known as GPS jamming.

For some, this is not a new phenomenon. In fact, GPS jamming has become a warning sign of military action in the Middle East.

Read more at the link in our bio.

📸 Tamara Almoayed
📝 Tamara Almoayed

06/24/2025

Former Second Gentleman Doug Emhoff will join the Gould School of Law, his alma mater, as a distinguished visiting professor in July.

After graduating from USC with a law degree in 1990, Emhoff worked as an attorney for three decades representing public and private clients, and advocating for higher education. In his time at the White House, Emhoff developed the National Strategy to Combat Antisemitism and advocated for removing legal barriers, in addition to numerous global diplomacy efforts.

He has returned to campus frequently since graduation, speaking on education, on antisemitism with the USC Shoah Foundation and acting as a mentor for students in Gould.

It is not clear yet what course Emhoff will teach.

Read more at the link in bio.

✍ Malcolm Caminero
📸 Louis Chen

03/01/2025

On Friday, the university announced that employees and faculty involved in the Office of Inclusion and Diversity will be merged and transferred into working directly with the USC Culture Team, a part of the Office of Culture, Ethics and Compliance.

“For several years, the Office of Inclusion and Diversity and the Culture Team have supported this sense of community, each developing programming and initiatives that embrace mutual respect and opportunity for all. Moving forward, this important work will continue through the merging of the full Office of Inclusion and Diversity Team with our Culture Team,” said Andrew Guzman, provost and senior vice president of student affairs, and Stacy Giwa, senior vice president of human resources, in a letter to the university.

The Office of Inclusiona and Diversity website has been completely wiped clean, with employee pages and previous links directing students to university resources being replaced with the message, “We’ve joined forces with the Culture Team.”

On February 14, the U.S. Department of Education issued guidance prohibiting colleges from considering race in any decision-making process or promoting diversity initiatives on campus. These decisions specifically pertain to admissions, financial aid and hiring training.

The letter directly states that higher education institutions have discriminated against “students on the basis of race, including white and Asian students.”

The Education Department gave colleges until Friday to comply, warning that failure to do so will result in the loss of federal funding.

This is a developing story

📝 Jason Pham and Victoria Laursen

02/28/2025

Charlie Kirk, conservative political activist and media personality, is coming to USC on Monday for the third stop of his “American Comeback Tour,” organized by Turning Point USA.

A Turning Point USA board member said Kirk would be set up at a table by Tommy Trojan at noon with a microphone. People from the crowd will be free to come up to the table and ask Kirk questions.

Read more at the link in bio.

📝 Adam Young, Molly Phan, Antonia Brooks
📸AP Photo/Rick Scuteri

02/26/2025

President Carol Folt said in an email Wednesday morning that USC is reviewing campus programs and practices to ensure compliance with President Donald Trump’s executive orders and federal agency directives.

In the email, Folt said the university receives “$1.35 billion in federal funding, including $650 million in student financial aid and $569 million for federally funded research and discovery.”

The announcement to the campus community comes after Trump issued executive orders targeting diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) programs. Folt said the university is in direct contact with members of U.S. Congress and critical federal agencies and is working with higher education partners across the country.

📝 Grace Galante and Matthew Royer

02/26/2025

Undergraduate Student Government (USG) presidential candidate Mikaela Bautista and her running mate Emma Fallon won the presidential election Tuesday night, beating out three other tickets.

The all-female team campaigned to provide opt-in ChatGPT+ accounts for all students. They also campaigned for expanded discount programs for Zipcar, Uber and Lyft, and extended hours at Doheny Library.

USG voting now utilizes an instant runoff system, or ranked-choice voting; If no ticket receives 50% of the vote, the ticket with the fewest votes is eliminated, and votes from that ticket are redistributed to the voters’ following choices.

Despite the close results, undergraduate voter turnout was relatively low, decreasing by more than 15% from last year’s USG election. This year, only 3,620 of USC’s 21,000 students participated in the election, which was accessible through an online link.

The senatorial race, which garnered campus-wide attention for numerous campaign violations and explosive disagreements between candidates, was less contested; After three candidates dropped out and one was disqualified, every student who was still in the race by the end of voting won a spot.

The new senators include: Jeremiah Boisrond, Sudeepta Murthy, Andrew Cardenas, Justin Shih, Sabeeh Mirza, Jad Kilani, Kevin Hoang, Kian Salek, Dakota Driemeyer, Karim Debian, Zehran Muqtadir and Moy Valdez.

Read more at the link in bio.

📝 Hali Mecklin and Laya Albert
💻 Nina Moothedath
📸 Photo courtesy of the Mikaela Bautista and Emma Fallon campaign

02/26/2025

Undergraduate Student Government (USG) presidential candidate Mikaela Bautista and her running mate Emma Fallon won the presidential election Tuesday night, beating out three other tickets.

The all-female team campaigned to provide opt-in ChatGPT+ accounts for all students. They also campaigned for expanded discount programs for Zipcar, Uber and Lyft, and extended hours at Doheny Library.

USG voting now utilizes an instant runoff system, or ranked-choice voting; If no ticket receives 50% of the vote, the ticket with the fewest votes is eliminated, and votes from that ticket are redistributed to the voters’ following choices.

Despite the close results, undergraduate voter turnout was relatively low, decreasing by more than 15% from last year’s USG election. This year, only 3,620 of USC’s 21,000 students participated in the election, which was accessible through an online link.

The senatorial race, which garnered campus-wide attention for numerous campaign violations and explosive disagreements between candidates, was less contested; After three candidates dropped out and one was disqualified, every student who was still in the race by the end of voting won a spot.

The new senators include: Jeremiah Boisrond, Sudeepta Murthy, Andrew Cardenas, Justin Shih, Sabeeh Mirza, Jad Kilani, Kevin Hoang, Kian Salek, Dakota Driemeyer, Karim Debian, Zehran Muqtadir and Moy Valdez.

Read more at the link in bio.

📝 Hali Mecklin and Laya Albert
💻 Nina Moothedath
📸 Photo courtesy of the Mikaela Bautista and Emma Fallon campaign

02/26/2025

Mason Yonover, a candidate with eyebrow-raising policy proposals and social media content, was disqualified from the 2025 Undergraduate Student Government (USG) senatorial race, Morning Trojan reported on Sunday, February 22. In an interview with Annenberg Media, he said he was “very proud” to be banned for obscenity.

Some of Yonover’s proposals included turning sorority houses into homeless shelters and spending USG’s entire $2,500,000 annual budget on a sports betting parlay. The disqualification of the sophomore creative writing major confirmed the victory of the 12 remaining candidates in the race. 12 seats were open, and two other candidates withdrew before the voting period began.

USG determined that Yonover violated USG’s Code of Ethics Article 5.B, which bars officers from “excessively vulgar, crude or discriminatory” language. The published case document Driemeyer v. Yonover references the repeated use of “vulgar” words by Yonover, including “crude language” during the senatorial forum and on social media.

Read more at the link in bio.

📝 Scott Hills, Ryan Kassebaum, Paige Shea and Gian Marco Velásquez
📸 Photo courtesy of Annenberg Media Youtube

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