Business News

PaperCo calls for wider creativity in 2009 student competition

The annual Brief Encounters course-work project competition, staged by PaperCo to give graphic design students hands-on experience of meeting commercial client demands, has been devised this year to tax their wider communication skills.

Saturday 04. July 2009 - The annual Brief Encounters course-work project competition, staged by PaperCo to give graphic design students hands-on experience of meeting commercial client demands, has been devised this year to tax their wider communication skills.

In two “live” commercial briefs set by PaperCo, one calls for students to create a desktop calendar for the merchant that “challenges the standard format” and, most importantly, communicates the sustainability factors and benefits of paper. The second, invites students to identify a strategy for advertising its dummy-making service to paper specifiers and printers – before then creating an appropriate multi-element platform of promotional media.

Submissions in response to the two PaperCo briefs form part of each participating student’s mainstream course work – the core principle of the Brief Encounters initiative that aims, uniquely, to foster a complete understanding of the practicalities involved in designing in the real world.

However, as an added incentive to students, all projects that meet the briefs also compete for Gold, Silver and Bronze Awards for Creative Excellence in each category, which are presented by PaperCo in the autumn following adjudication by a panel of independent judges.

“We launched the Brief Encounters initiative in 2002 to make a tangible contribution to the education of tomorrow’s designers and it is now a major plank in our corporate responsibility platform,” says PaperCo’s corporate social responsibility director, Veronica Heaven. “Throughout, we have worked closely with graphic design course leaders to devise meaningful briefs that can add value to students’ education and this year we believe we have set goals that will usefully stretch their capabilities.

“The 2009 Brief Encounters round also breaks new ground by involving HND graphic design students as well as those studying for their BA (Hons) degrees. HND students from Northbrook College Sussex will be submitting work for the first time and we look forward to them challenging those from our more regular college participants for the Gold, Silver and Bronze Awards.”