Graduate school was never part of the plan for Kay Cui ’24.
She did well in classes like math, history, and English, but she didn’t want to study those subjects in depth. Instead, she preferred immersing herself in the world of entertainment and spent much of her childhood playing piano, flute, oboe, and cello.
Her plan was to earn a BA in Communications from Northwestern University and then start working.
“I remember participating in a high school poll about who thought they would do more than four more years of school after graduation,” she says. “I thought, ‘No way am I doing more than four years!’ ”
During her freshman year at Northwestern, Cui realized she could earn her undergraduate degree in just three years—which meant she could earn a master’s degree and still stick to her four-year plan.
Thanks to the pandemic, her undergraduate experience hadn’t given her as much time on campus as she had imagined. Many of her classes during that time were completed online, and she wasn’t quite ready to leave college behind.
Around that same time, she discovered the MS in Leadership for Creative Enterprises (MSLCE) program. It offered exactly what she was looking for: the chance to explore music and entertainment from a business perspective so she would better understand the impacts of things like marketing, law, and finance.
So far, she’s been pleasantly surprised about what she’s learning—and how she’s learning it. Case in point: Arts and Entertainment Law and Ethics, taught by Associate Professor Rick Morris.
“At the beginning of that class, everyone was so nervous,” she says. “Law can be intimidating and full of jargon. But he makes it almost like story time. We get to read through relevant cases and talk about them. Meanwhile, we’re learning how to create contracts and protect the money we make in the industry.”
Meanwhile, in Lecturer Freda Love Smith’s Understanding the Creative Industries course, Cui is getting hands-on experience in creating transmedia franchises that tell stories and cultivate experiences across multiple platforms and formats. She’s working with her small group to develop a transmedia story focused on the game series Legend of Zelda.
Cui also enjoys the lively class discussions about different aspects of the entertainment industry, such as labor unions and strikes. What she’s learning has even prompted her to reach out to coworkers from former internships to talk about what she’s learning and how it connects to the real world.
She’s taking every opportunity to not only talk about what she learns, but also apply it.
As a well-known DJ (Vitamin K), performing at some of the most well-known events across campus, she’s able to apply the new tactics she’s learning to her business.
Kay DJing at the Metro Opening for Dreamer Isioma and Flo Milli at an A&O Event
She’s also part of Soul4Real, an on-campus a cappella group that often performs at Black House and brings a spectrum of historically Black musical genres to light, including R&B, soul, and hip-hop.
In addition, she’s involved in Niteskool Productions, a student-run music video production house. During her sophomore year, she transitioned into a co-president role within the group to help some of the senior members of the team create a record label division.
“There are a lot of talented people here, and I wanted to help give them a platform to create music and music videos,” she describes. “Participating in Niteskool Productions allows me to do that for them.”
Finally, she’s co-head of marketing for A&O Productions, a programming board that brings the best in live entertainment to Northwestern’s campus.
“They do everything from concerts and speakers to film screenings,” says Cui. “It gives everyone access to so many kinds of entertainment beyond large-concert events.”
These experiences, combined with what she’s learning through MSLCE, are empowering her to rethink the kind of work she wants to pursue. For example, her work on live concerts and speaker events with A&O Productions, combined with a Long Island Nets internship, where she learned about sports entertainment, has cemented her interest in live entertainment.
“Think about basketball games,” she explains. “They have entire game presentation departments that oversee all the action happening during a game, like mascots, dance teams, hosts, and music. They script out all those parts of the game. With the skills and expertise that I’m building now, I can see myself leading a team like that.”
Three reasons Kay Cui gets involved in the arts outside the MSLCE classroom:
1. To broaden her horizons. “I get to meet so many great people who are interested in what I am, as well as in tangential industries. We can all come together to share our skills and resources.”
2. To apply lessons in the real world. “I get the space to function professionally and build skills outside the classroom.”
3. To help grow the industry. “I get to support artists who need help promoting their work or building their platform.”
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