Basically, the lore around screenwriting admissions is that after you get accepted into USC as a whole, they divide up the screenplay applications and give them to the more tenured professors. And out of every pile that these professors have to read, they pick one, maybe two applicants to fight for. And the professors duke it out to decide who gets in and the professor who picked you is called “Your Champion”. And part of the lore is that the screenwriters find out who is but time is ticking and I still haven’t found mine. 

Context:

The informant is a college student with a major in screenwriting. When discussing the experiences of being a screenwriting major, the informant is reminded of this specific piece of lore within the screenwriting cohort.

Personal Thoughts:

This particular legend demonstrates how folklore can exist within educational communities, and how folklore develops as time goes on. As the informant explained, this is a particular event that would happen during admissions, every year. And while there is no direct explanation of the Champion when students are admitted, students gradually become aware of this legend as they join the school, essentially indoctrinating them into this folk community. This not only allows for the folklore to live on every year as the story is passed on, but it also unifies this specific group as a folk community, since they are sharing this story together and continuing to pass it on as more people become a part of the folk community.