Open to everyone, particularly students and young creative artists

Deadline: 4th September 2020 – 23:59 GMT

Background 

Over the past year, as student unions, organisations and movements from around the world, we have been discussing how to cooperate in a more structured and strategic way. A voluntary consortium has emerged, comprised of regional federations, including the All-Africa Students Union (AASU), Commonwealth Students’ Association (CSA), European Students Union (ESU) and Organising Bureau of European School Student Unions (OBESSU) and the Latin-American Student Organisation (OCLAE) and national organisations and movements which together cover 143 student unions in 95 countries. Together, we decided to come together as the Global Student Forum. 

Our cooperation is based on shared values which direct the way we work and what we want to achieve. As student movements, we share a common fight for meaningful participation in the decisions that shape our lives, the future of the societies we live in and the planet we live on. We have discovered that we are organising around similar issues across the world: high fees for education and student debt; the quality and relevance of education; climate change; inequalities; and violence in our institutions whether in the form of sexual harassment, racism, gender violence, mass shootings, police brutality or war. As democratic and representative movements, we face de-legitimation and repression by authoritarian governments. We face apathy from those who believe that education is a commodity and violence from reactionary and xenophobic youth organisations organising in our schools and campuses. So we come together to urgently develop solidarity and collaboration, in order to achieve educational justice and as allies in a wider struggle for democracy, social justice and human rights. We do so by building a platform that practices democratic values itself, energising our collective action and building democracy through our own horizontal structure, putting the aspirations and needs of student representative bodies at the forefront of our work. We are committed to serving established student organisations and networks but also to incubating and supporting new groups as they arise. 

We are united by the beliefs that democratic, representative and independent student movements are essential and that they should be able to operate without repression. We are fighting for free, public, accountable education that guarantees equal opportunity for everyone without discrimination. We campaign against segregation and defend the rights of the marginalised. We are against war as a means of resolving conflict and are using solidarity as a way to build peace; and we stand for the human rights of the displaced, migrants and people forced to live under occupation. As ecologists, we are fighting the destruction of the planet and working towards a safe and dignified life for our species in the future. And as feminists, we are fighting for political, economic, personal, and social equality. We stand together because we recognise the interconnectedness of our struggles and because we are resolute in our fight to uphold the rights of people in every country. 

Having a meaningful logo 

As we look into developing our visual identity, we have decided to launch a public contest for a logo instead of reaching out to ad and media companies exclusively. As student activists, we have developed incredible internal capacities to face the public with strong communication and a global student platform, we would like to receive as many contributions as possible for our logo. 

The words highlighted in bold in the background text highlight some words of our mission statement and values that we would like to see reflected in the logo: a global perspective, solidarity, students’ power and ability to change the status quo. We are looking for a logo that tells our story of advocates and activists for democracy, solidarity, ecology, feminism, anti-racism and anti-discrimination. 

Process & Timeline 

The contest is open to everyone. If you have creativity, inspiration and graphic design skills this contest is made for you! 

In order to participate, interested people should send their logo proposal in JPG or PNG format to recruitment@globalstudentforum.org by 04/09/2020 23:59 GMT. There’s no requirement on the size, the resolution or the colours. Should you have any questions, please reach out to our Interim Secretariat (recruitment@globalstudentforum.org). 

The same person can submit multiple proposals in one email, zip folder or shared folder. 

The Global Student Forum commits to not sharing and using non-selected submissions. 

The Communications Working Group of the GSF, composed of Members of the Steering committee will make the final selection. The Steering Committee is the executive body of the Global Student Forum, tasked with setting up the structure, coordinating the membership strategy and transitioning towards a more stable phase of the network. It is composed by 7 people: 5 representatives from the regional organisations, from Africa, South America, the Commonwealth and Europe, a 2 representatives nominated by the many other national organisations joining GSF. Once the committee selects one proposal, they might request minor changes (changes in order of items/colours) but not substantial changes in the selected proposal. 

If your proposal is selected, you will be asked to submit: 

• Logo in different formats (white/transparent background, horizontal and vertical, png, jpg, pdf and vectorial) 
• Font proposal 
• Headed paper 
• Powerpoint template 
• Business card template 
• Facebook, Twitter and Instagram header and profile picture 
• Email signature template 
• A document including the logo font and the exact colour palette. 

Copyright protected images are not allowed. All images must be created, enhanced or altered by the participant (if you use elements not created by you, such as patterns, shapes, textures, typographies, etc., ensure all of them are copyright free). 

The Prize: The winner will be awarded a sum of 2000 EUR paid as a bank transfer. 

This is an international call open to submissions from everyone. We especially encourage students, young artists and creative designers from all corners of the globe to apply, regardless of gender, abilities and socio-economic background.

Timeline of deadlines

• 14/08/2020– The contest is launched publically

• 04/09//2020 23:59 GMT– Deadline for submissions. All submissions should be sent to: recruitment@globalstudentforum.org

• 05-06/07/2020 – The Communications Working Group of the Global Student Forum takes a decision on the winning logo

• 07/09/2020 – The winner is notified (including of needed changes)

• 11/09/2020 – 18/09/2020 – Deadline to submit all follow-up material: Logo (11/09/2020) and other items (18/09/2020)

For information, please contact us at recruitment@globalstudentforum.org 

We look forward to all submissions!

Download the full call on this link.