Applications Open! Enroll for Summer 2027 at 2026 Tuition Pricing Until Sept 30
Plan and help execute a live summit in this two-week hospitality and event management program for high school students at UCLA.
Rated 4.3 out of 5 for course experience by high school students surveyed across the broader program in 2026.
Course Description
What does it take to welcome a VIP, coordinate hundreds of moving parts, and keep a major event on schedule when something goes wrong? Students examine hospitality and large-scale event production through simulations, case studies, and a live project. The course connects guest experience with the operational decisions that make it possible.
Students practice hotel and front-of-house operations, food and beverage coordination, venue selection, accessibility, risk assessment, crowd flow, volunteer management, and service recovery. They design a reception for 500 guests, map logistics for a 10,000-person event, respond to a simulated catering crisis, and draft a run of show that coordinates talent, technology, and operations. Case studies include major sporting and entertainment events in Los Angeles.
The capstone is direct work on the Beyond Now Summit, a live speaker conference for high school students. Teams take responsibility for logistics, guest and speaker services, volunteer coordination, media and communications, or event execution. Students complete a rehearsal, contribute during the live event, and present a post-event analysis with a portfolio-ready record of their planning, results, and lessons learned.
This two-week high school program takes place at UCLA in Los Angeles, California. The program is developed by UCLA and offered in partnership with Summer Discovery. It is available to residential and commuter students. Beyond class, students connect focused academic work with campus life, growing independence, and clearer direction about what they may want to study or pursue next.
What Will You Do?
• Practice VIP check-in, guest service, and service-recovery decisions
• Design food and beverage plans for a large reception
• Map venue logistics, accessibility, crowd flow, and risk controls
• Draft a run of show with operational cues and contingency time
• Recruit and lead volunteers through simulated event challenges
• Rehearse, execute, and evaluate a live student speaker summit
Learning Outcomes
By the end of the course, students will be able to:
• Design hospitality and event plans around guest needs, scale, and operational constraints
• Build logistics, risk, volunteer, and run-of-show documents for a live event
• Evaluate event execution and present evidence-based improvements
Students will leave with a portfolio-ready summit capstone, experience contributing to a live event, and greater clarity about further study or careers in hospitality, events, communications, or operations.
Why Hospitality and Event Management Skills Matter
Hospitality and event management ask students to design an experience while controlling the systems behind it. Guest service, food and beverage, venue access, staffing, technology, timing, and risk must work together. A decision that looks small to an attendee can require coordination across several teams.
Planning tools make that complexity manageable. Logistics maps reveal bottlenecks, a run of show aligns people and cues, and risk assessments force teams to prepare before problems appear. Working on a live event also develops judgment under pressure, because students must communicate clearly, adapt quickly, and evaluate what happened after the audience leaves.
Who Should Attend?
This course is for high school students who have completed 9th, 10th, 11th, or 12th grade and are curious about hospitality, event production, guest experience, sports or entertainment operations, communications, or leadership. It is a strong fit for students who enjoy organizing complex projects and seeing a plan become a live experience.
Students should be ready to take responsibility within a production team, use shared planning documents, rehearse carefully, respond to real-time challenges, and reflect honestly on results. The live summit requires dependable participation and collaboration across roles. A completed program application is required.
Recommended by More Than 4 out of 5 Students
Based on students surveyed in Summer Discovery’s 2026 UCLA high school program.
Why UCLA?
UCLA gives high-school students the opportunity to explore an academic interest while experiencing university life in Los Angeles, a city where entertainment, technology, business, science, and culture constantly intersect. The campus has its own community and rhythm while connecting students to a wider environment built around creativity and new ideas.
Students learn alongside peers, navigate a large campus, and gain independence through everyday choices and responsibilities. Time outside class expands the experience through friendships, campus life, and opportunities to notice which subjects and settings hold their attention. For families, UCLA offers a valuable combination of substantive academics, personal growth, and clearer direction about what a student may want to study, experience more deeply, or pursue next.
Hospitality and Event Management in Action
Hospitality and event professionals work in hotels, restaurants, conferences, festivals, sports, concerts, tourism, corporate events, and major international gatherings. Their responsibilities can include guest services, catering, venue operations, volunteer coordination, communications, accessibility, security planning, logistics, and day-of execution.
Students try several of those functions through simulations and the Beyond Now Summit. The live capstone can help them identify whether they are most drawn to guest experience, operational planning, communications, leadership, venue logistics, or the fast-moving coordination required when an event opens to its audience.
Summer Discovery Certificate of Completion
After successfully finishing this course, you will be awarded a certification completion for your accomplishment.
*This is a preview, not what you will receive