ELIGIBILITY
- Entry is free.
- Open to current NAIA member institutions eligible during the Year One competition cycle.
- One official entry per institution.
- Entry must be submitted or formally authorized by the institution.
- The submitting contact must be an authorized school representative such as athletics administration, communications/SID staff, marketing, president’s office, or another person designated by the institution.
- Student-created or community-created work may be included, but the school remains responsible for the official submission and all permissions.
- Schools may collaborate with students, alumni, faculty, local media, community members, and creative partners.
- Production budget, school size, enrollment, equipment, or professional production resources do not affect eligibility or judging.
INITIAL ENTRY REQUIREMENTS
Each school must submit:
- School name
- City and state
- Primary school contact
- Contact title
- Contact email
- Contact phone
- Official school website
- Submitted story title
- Short written story summary
- Video Delivery Link to the completed primary competition video
- Optional link password/access instructions
- Checkbox confirming the link has been tested and is accessible
- Checkbox confirming the submitting institution will keep the delivery link active until NAIAmerica confirms receipt
- Confirmation that the institution authorizes the entry
- Confirmation that required music, footage, photography, likeness, and other content permissions have been secured
PRIMARY COMPETITION VIDEO
What is the story of your school, your people, and your town?
- MP4 preferred; MOV accepted.
- Maximum file size: 5 GB.
- Maximum runtime: 3:00 minutes
- There is no required minimum runtime.
- Landscape / horizontal 16:9 format is preferred.
- 1080p or higher is preferred, but not required. Production equipment and resolution beyond basic viewability are not judging criteria.
- Videos created with smartphones are fully acceptable.
- Professional production is neither required nor favored.
- The video must clearly tell or introduce the story of the school, its people, and its community.
- Schools may use interviews, narration, archival material, campus footage, community footage, photographs, natural sound, music, graphics, or other storytelling techniques for which they have appropriate rights.
- Entries should be understandable to a national audience unfamiliar with the institution or town.
- Captions are strongly encouraged.
It should focus on people, place, community, culture, character, history, tradition, impact, and what makes that institution’s story worth discovering.
SUBMISSION METHOD
Schools will complete an official NAIAmerica online entry form on the NAIAmerica website.
The website will not accept or store large video-file uploads directly. The entry form will require a Video Delivery Link to the school’s completed competition video.
Accepted delivery methods include Google Drive, Dropbox, Microsoft OneDrive, or another comparable file-sharing service that provides direct access to the submitted video.
The submitting institution is responsible for ensuring the link remains active and that 446Sports/NAIAmerica can access and download the file without requesting additional permission.
Submit the original video file through the delivery link, rather than using a YouTube page as the primary submission method.