Written by Sophie Leopold, Photo courtesy of Angie Stong
Since graduating from SCAD in 2018, Emilie Kefalas [B.F.A Writing] has remained a busy bee in pursuit of her goals. Kefalas’s position at Disney [external communications coordinator at Disney Parks, Experiences & Products in Glendale, California] and promoting her own work keeps her buzzing around the country. Kefalas isn’t one to shy away from multitasking, for juggling her ventures is all part of the fun. “Replay,” Kefalas’s play about female sports announcers, is scheduled for a Manhattan theatre debut this October.
“A Capitol’s Dream” is a children’s book in which her words and illustrations are illuminated as a tour guide of Capitol Hill. “It was a passion project,” Kefalas said. “Now that it’s complete I cannot wait to do more in a series of US capital-based books.”
Before Kefalas was a published author or even a storyteller, she was a listener. Kefalas describes her earliest relationship with reading and writing as a sort of yin and yang dynamic. As a small child, picking up a book wasn’t what ignited those initial sparks. However, narrative was shared with her, she devoured it. Kefalas remembers being read to, observing the world around and spinning her own stories from those young perceptions.
By her teens, Kefalas was finding regular solace in journaling and poetry. Her prose writing was for her eyes only as she gained confidence for her grasp on language. Although Kefalas knew she was on the writing path, SCAD wasn’t the next stop. With sights set on an English degree, Kefalas latched onto convention at Saint Mary’s in Notre Dame, Illinois. Her liberal arts studies prompted a series of robust opportunities, from a Congressional internship in Washington to the Disney college program in Orlando. Both positions became a springboard for her endeavors today.
At Disney, Kefalas was inspired to realign her trajectory towards the creative. She thought back to SCAD, the school that had hovered on the edge of her original undergraduate search. Kefalas found herself thinking: what ever happened to that design school? “When you taste a really good food and the flavors linger for years after,” said Kefalas, in regards to the way she remembered the possibility of attending SCAD.
Kefalas made the switch, arriving in the fall of 2015 at the Savannah campus, and from day one, she dabbled in everything. “There’s no barrier between you and getting your work out there while you are at SCAD,” Kefalas said. “Start your own business, freelance, go ahead and make money with your skillset.” Kefalas stresses collaboration just as much as personal development. “Whatever you want to do or try, partner with it,” Kefalas said. “Nothing is holding you back. Take advantage of collaboration. These are the skills that you cannot gain anywhere else if you are
The most expansive of Kefalas’s SCAD collaborations took place
Hands on involvement with student media gave Kefalas momentum towards more prospects to share her work. She recommends keeping tabs on local outlets, who is writing for them and what they are writing about. “Ground yourself in place, and see what is published there,” Kefalas said. “Everything you hand in to a professor, write as if you were submitting it, and then go submit it.”
When in doubt, just
