Sarah Hutter '25
Sarah Hutter '25
Major: Economics
Involvements: The Los Angeles Loyolan, Election 2024, Model UN, LMU Choirs, Real Estate Society
Sarah Hutter ’25, an economics major and philosophy minor from Los Altos Hills, California, was drawn to Loyola Marymount University’s Jesuit mission, Honors Program, small class sizes, and beautiful campus. She quickly discovered that LMU is the type of place where it is what you make of it.
Now a news associate at CNN’s world headquarters, Hutter traces much of her growth back to the emphasis on educating the whole person outside the classroom, and choosing to stay when she was debating on transferring. Everything changed when she found her space at the Los Angeles Loyolan student newspaper. “I’m forever grateful for what I made it [LMU] be for myself,” she reflects. “And for the faculty and staff along the way who kept pushing me up.”
One of the most influential voices was Carol Costello, a lecturer in journalism in the Bellarmine College of Library Arts, an award-winning journalist, and a former CNN anchor. Costello was someone who Hutter fantasized meeting when coming to LMU, but Hutter didn’t anticipate being able to call her a mentor by the time she left the bluff. “Working with her as closely as I was able to was an absolute dream come true,” Hutter says. “I am where I am because of her and am continuously inspired by her gracious warmth and fierce commitment to authentic storytelling.”
Hutter immersed herself in campus life, most notably as the editor-in-chief of the Los Angeles Loyolan and as the executive producer for Election 2024, a project covering the presidential election by Gen Z, for Gen Z. She led a team of up to 20 staff members that included LMU students and freelancers around the country. “We were able to travel to six swing states, work on an immigration report at the Tijuana-San Diego border, interview American electeds and representatives in Washington, D.C. and more,” she says. “This was truly a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity that opened me up to our country beyond the bluff. I never would have had this experience if it weren’t for LMU.”
Her most meaningful moments at LMU weren’t tied to a typical event on campus. The bells of Sacred Heart Chapel chime every 15 minutes and hold a special place from her time on the bluff. “I spent all four years living on the bluff so that I could be as close to my work as possible. I’d hear the bells at 3 in the morning, gently reminding me to go to sleep. I’d hear them at 7:45 a.m. as I raced to my 8 a.m. class,” Hutter reflected. “Their ever gentle yet consistent presence is something I didn’t realize I’d miss so much.”
If she had to describe her LMU experience in one word, it would be “unexpected.” The word encapsulates how Hutter took advantage of all the opportunities that were presented to her on the bluff, from friendships to falling in love with her career in journalism. Among LMU’s five student EXP pillars, “Live a Life of Purpose” resonates most with her. “I didn’t just find a career path here,” she says. “No matter what you choose to do, if you follow through with commitment and ethic, you will find and promote such a purpose.”
Today at CNN, Hutter brings that clarity and conviction into every story she helps tell. While her path is just beginning, she carries LMU with her the lessons, the mentors, the mission.
When asked what message she’d leave behind for the university that shaped her, she said it was impossible to condense it to one message. Instead, she left a guide for the class of 2029.