Festival of Excellence FAQ

All current SUU undergraduate and graduate students are encouraged to submit. Your project must be scholarly or creative work that has been reviewed and approved by a faculty mentor.

Yes, SUU faculty and staff are free to submit a presentation to the Festival of Excellence. While the festival's primary focus has shifted to student presentations, we still welcome and accept submissions from faculty and staff.

The submission process is managed through your mySUU portal.

1. When you click the application link, the system will automatically recognize your role (faculty, staff, or student).
2. You will be directed to the specific registration form designed for faculty and staff.
3. Simply complete the required fields on that form to submit your presentation.

No, please do not submit applications on behalf of your students. Students must log in and submit their own presentations through the portal. This ensures the system recognizes them as students and gathers all the relevant information for the program.

Submissions are collected through an online registration form. The portal will open in December. For the 2026 festival, the registration and abstract submission window is scheduled to close on Friday, February 13, 2026.

An abstract is a short, powerful summary of your project. It should briefly explain your research question, methods, key findings, and conclusion. Abstracts are typically limited to 250 words or less.

The Festival of Excellence is designed to showcase all forms of high-quality student scholarship and creative work from across campus. You can present on any of your scholarly and creative work.

Yes. A faculty mentor is required for all student submissions. You must list their name on the submission form, and they must have approved your abstract before you submit it.

You should select the college that your faculty mentor is housed in. For example, if your mentor is a professor in the College of Education and Human Development, you should select the College of Education and Human Development on the form, even if your own major is in a different college.

The submission is categorized by your mentor's primary college/department. If you aren't sure, check your mentor's faculty profile on the SUU website or ask them directly.

Only one student should submit the abstract for the entire group. That person will act as the primary contact and will be responsible for listing all other student co-authors and the faculty mentor on the form.

No. It is common to present research that is still in progress. Your abstract should summarize what you have done so far and what you expect your final results to show.

Yes, you can submit more than one abstract.

You will be asked to choose your preferred format. The main types are:

• Oral Presentation: A 10-minute talk, similar to a conference paper, followed by a 3-minute Q&A.
• Poster Presentation: A 30"x40" visual poster. You stand by your poster during a dedicated session to discuss your work one-on-one.
• ThunderTalk: A fast-paced format where you present 20 slides that automatically advance every 20 seconds (6 minutes, 40 seconds total).
• Performance/Exhibition: For creative works in music, theatre, art, or dance.

Check with your mentor. If the group project is a required class project, then all members may have to present. For poster presentations, if you have 4 or more authors that need to present, please split into two groups with half your group presenting for the first half of the poster session, and the other half presenting for the second half.

No, oral presentations are not required to have visual materials. Students can talk about their presentation with their mentor, and decide if their paper presentation would benefit from images, quotes on slides, or other visual material.

You will be notified via your SUU email. Acceptance notices are usually sent out a few weeks after the submission deadline, often by early or mid-March.

Once the submission form is closed, abstracts are considered final. Proofread carefully with your mentor before you hit the submit button. However, if you need to make edits to the abstract and/or add or remove co-authors, please reach out to festivalofexcellence@suu.edu before the program goes live.

After the program goes live, you can search scheduled presentations. Use the search function to find a specific author or topic.