All entries submitted to the National Student Show & Conference (NSSC) must have been produced by a student currently pursuing an undergraduate degree at an accredited college, university, or art school. Graduate work is not accepted.

All entries must have been produced between January 2022–December 2022 as part of a school’s curriculum, with the exception of entries submitted to portfolio categories. Work produced outside of a school’s curriculum is not permitted (e.g. personal, freelance, or work produced at an internship).

Do not plagiarize. NSSC defines plagiarism (as found on ethicsingraphicdesign.org) as the unauthorized use or close imitation of existing work and the representation of it as wholly one’s own original work.

Any entries found by NSSC or the judges to be plagiarized will not only be immediately disqualified but the professor or school of the errant entrant will also be notified. Additional academic consequences may follow according to the school’s code of ethics.

There is no limit to the number of entries allowed per student or per school.

With the exception of the Group Projects category, you may also submit the same work in multiple categories as applicable (e.g. Ice Cream Shop Rebranding Project may have assets that could be entered individually into categories like Logos, Packaging, Branding Campaign, etc.).

NSSC defines group projects as any entry where 2–4 students were specifically assigned a project with the express direction to work together to create an end product.

Pay close attention to group eligibility in the Advertising, Interactive Design, and Motion Design categories. If the category description does not specify group projects, only single-student submissions are accepted.

Awards for winning entries are given to the submitting student. NSSC encourages the submitting student to alert their group members of the award recognition and leaves any sharing of the award money to the winner’s discretion.

Unless all assets in a submitted entry have been created only by the single submitting student, proper credits must be provided in the online entry form’s Credits field at the time of submission. Any assets not created by the submitting student that are used for the submitted entry must include proper credits (e.g. “Art Direction: Submitting Student, Illustration: Artist’s Name, Typography: Artist’s Name”).

NSSC recognizes that students may be tasked to use non-student-produced assets to create layouts or designs. However, the following limitations apply:

Any usage of non-student-produced assets (e.g. stock photography or stock illustration) must be credited in the online entry form’s Credits field (e.g. “Image(s) courtesy of istockphoto.com”).

Any non-student-produced assets must have been significantly altered from the original asset (e.g. multiple stock photos combined to create a new image).

If your artwork uses images for collage manipulation or for editorial work that falls under the Fair Use provisions of the Copyright Act, please clearly state this in the online entry form’s Credits field.

EARLY BIRD PRICING: $30 per entry through January 31, 2023. REGULAR PRICING: $40 per entry through February 17, 2023. 

All entries should be submitted digitally by 11:59 P.M. CST on February 17, 2023. No physical entries will be accepted for judging. No late entries will be accepted. Please follow the submission guidelines for each category carefully as these vary. Entries submitted incorrectly will be disqualified.

All entries require a title, short description of the project’s parameters, and a current professor’s name and email. For select scholarship categories, NSSC requires additional paperwork from you and your professor that will be requested by email (as noted in the category submission details).

You may submit up to 5 images per entry unless otherwise stated in the category submission details. If submitting multiple images, upload files in the order in which you’d like them viewed during judging. For additional security, you are welcome to include an order reference in the bottom right corner of each image (e.g. 1 of 5, 2 of 5, etc.)

All images will be printed on 11” x 17” paper at the largest possible orientation for judging. Please consider what view makes the most sense per category (e.g. a small grid of Logo variations, a mockup of a Brochure showing both the closed cover and open interior, etc.). Each image can be designed as you would a single page in your student portfolio.

Some categories allow up to 3 URL submissions (e.g. Advertising, Motion Design, etc). For website submissions, NSSC also requires a single, project-related image will also be required to serve as the project’s reference thumbnail image during judging.

Do NOT include your name or the name of your school in the online entry form’s Title or Description fields. Do NOT display your name or the name of your school in your work unless it is part of the design (e.g. senior exit show poster or self-branding). This helps ensure that our judges have an unbiased opinion when reviewing your work.

If your work is selected for the Show gallery, you may be notified with a request and specifications for a physical art submission or alternate digital format. All physical submissions are printed, prepared, and delivered to the Show at the student’s expense.