Showcase your talent

The President’s Holiday Card Contest is now open for students to submit their artwork and be eligible to win a $1,000 scholarship.

This year’s theme is to reflect what the holiday season means to the contestant. The design must incorporate UTRGV, the holiday season and the color orange.

To enter the contest, participants must be UTRGV students in good academic and judicial standing. Dual-credit and concurrent students are not eligible. The artwork is submitted electronically, along with the official entry form.

A $1,000 scholarship will be awarded to the first-place winner of the card contest and a $500 scholarship to second- and third-place winners. The scholarships will be for the upcoming spring semester.

The winning card will be reproduced digitally and sent via email to the campus community.

UTRGV President Guy Bailey will print a few hundred hard copies that will be sent to people on his mailing list, which include key stakeholders of the university, other presidents and the chancellor, according to Patrick Gonzales, associate vice president for University Marketing and Communications. Credit will be given to the card’s artist.

The deadline to submit artwork is Nov. 8. Winners will be announced Dec. 7 and will be recognized at Bailey’s holiday reception, where they will be awarded the scholarship.

Gonzales said Bailey brought the holiday card contest tradition with him when he first started working for UTRGV.

“He just loves it because it really allows our students to kind of show their talent and their creativity and to also reward those students who are victorious in the contest,” Gonzales said.

According to the contest website, the card specifications are that the finished size must be 7 x 5 inches with a .25-inch bleed and a safety zone of 6.75 x 4.75 inches. The card may be in landscape or portrait orientation, be of full quality, uncompressed only, and all artwork must be CMYK at 300 dpi. The accepted formats are PDF, EPS, AI, TIF or JPEG.

If the digital artwork does not meet these requirements, the submission will not be considered.

Raymundo Lopez, a history sophomore, said he would like to see the card incorporate presents and family.

“I guess, basically, presents,” Lopez said. “It’s one of the main things people look into when it comes to the holiday season and I guess more of, like, family gathering.”

Past winning cards have included holiday objects such as piñatas, seasonal flowers, a Vaquero boot and a lotería card.

Gonzales encourages students to participate in the contest.

“I would like to encourage all of our students to consider … entering the contest,” he said. “We’re always amazed by the talent of our students.”

For more information on the contest, contact the University Marketing and Communications Office at 665-2741 or umc@utrgv.edu. To submit an entry, visit utrgv.edu/feature/eblasts/president-holiday-card/contest.