Grad Show
The Grad Show is a self-funded event organized by students to celebrate your success in the program. It is usually held the last week of Fieldwork. That’ll be Wednesday, April 22, 2026. The goal of the event is to share the design work from your three years in the program with family, friends, faculty, and industry professionals. It’s also a great networking opportunity.
Grad Show Work Spreadsheet
Your first task is to choose a team to which you wish to contribute for Grad Show organization and fundraising.
As you accomplish concrete tasks to organize the Grad Show and do fundraising, you’ll document it in this spreadsheet.
Fundraising
Fundraising events are held to support the Grad Show, including bake sales, art sales, and pub nights. All students are expected to participate in fundraising activities. A GoFundMe page has been a great source of revenue.
While the Fundraising Team coordinates activities, they are supported by all students in the cohort. For example, the team will coordinate a bake sale, while some students bake goods, and others sell them.
The rental fee for the Horticulture Building is about $3000 for the evening. There are other event costs. We generally want to fundraise over $4000. It’s a good idea to leave some money behind for potential future program project funding.
Team Workings & Functions
Two people are elected as Grad Show Chairs to oversee all activities as well as coordinate and attend meetings with team leads. They meet with Alain to provide progress updates. They act as overseers of, and liaisons between all the teams leads. Team leads are the voice for their teams.
Everyone needs to participate in one of the teams listed on the Work Log. Being on a team doesn’t limit you. You can participate in any of the activities. Teams are expected to collaborate. For instance, if the Motion Team needs brand graphics, they’ll request them with specifications from the Branding Team.
Motion folks produce and manage on-brand motion graphics for the website, for event promotions, and for the motion pieces that play at the Grad Show. They also provide motion content to the Social Team.
The Branding Team adopts the identity that was chosen by the cohort. They collaborate with the designer of the brand to create branding guidelines. The branding team mostly prepares on-brand graphics required by other teams. All creative decisions are shared with the cohort.
Wendy Warren will be available to support the construction of the grad website by the Web Team. Assets are provided by the Branding Team. All creative decisions about the site are shared with the cohort.
Social media promotion is managed by the Social Team. They promote each student on all social channels with graphics provided by the Branding Team. Fundraising events are also posted to socials, along with documenting all the semester’s happenings. All this is supported with photos provided by the Photography Team. They help to coordinate the photography of students for the website. They document events including bake sales, pub nights and more.
The Event
We historically have started setting up the event at 2pm on the day of the Grad Show. If we hold the event at the Horticulture Building, we don’t need to rent banquet tables. There’s space for each student to have a 1.5m banquet table. We do need to source table linens. Students bring extension cords and power bars.