Ready to make campus a safer and more beautiful place?
Then read below to find out how you can begin, complete, and submit your unique decal design!
Step 1
Find inspiration for your design!
Take a walk in nature, look through the photos of birds in your camera roll, or get lost in the archives and materials in our libraries.
You can also read up about ways glass and windows can generally be made safer for birds here and here for additional inspiration and a better understanding of the science behind window “bird-proofing."
Step 2
Decide which window you would like to submit a decal design for and download the corresponding design template below.
The three participating windows in the 2025 Safer Skies decal design competition are located in Yeh College, Lakeside Apartments, and Lawrence Apartments. Your status as either undergrad, grad student, or faculty and staff does not limit your choice for the window you can submit a design for. In fact, you can come up with one design and resize it for each of the three windows, making a total of three submissions.
There is no limit on the number of submissions one individual can make! We are excited to see your unlimited creativity.
Step 3
Submit your decal design at the “Design Submission Form.”
Once you have created your decal design, whether digitally or on physical paper by hand, you can submit it at the “Design Submission Form," which can be seen on the left side of this page.
The file formats you can make your design submission in are listed on the submission form. You will notice .ai is not one of the formats, so you can either export the .ai file containing your design as drawn on the gridded template as an accepted file format (.png, .jpeg, .csv, etc.) or you can compress the .ai file into a .zip file. Please do not delete the .ai file of your work on your personal device - if you are selected as a winner, we will be in touch with you to obtain your original .ai file design.
Make sure to fill out all required fields in the submission form. You will see that you will be able to discuss the meaning behind your work in the form, so be sure to describe your design in a way that conveys your inspiration to the competition committee, who will be reviewing all design submissions.
The deadline to submit decal designs to the Safer Skies competition is
Sunday, March 16, 2025 at 11:59:59 PM EST.
If you believe you will need an extension, please contact us at the emails listed on the FAQ page before the March 16 deadline.
Design Templates: Download Here
Click the links below to download the decal design template for the window you would like to submit a design for:
Please aim to create a design that maximizes template space use. It is important that you attempt to have a part of your design in most squares of the grid for maximum window coverage. This will maximize the perception of the window as a barrier by birds, especially by smaller ones, like hummingbirds.
Although we encourage you to create your design digitally using the templates above, you may also hand-draw your design, which will be vectorized later if selected as a winning submission. If you choose to do so, please make sure your submission dimensions adhere to the following guidelines:
- If you are submitting a design to be considered for application in the Yeh College window, make your submission dimensions 54" W x 80" H.
- If you are submitting a design to be considered for application in the Lakeside Apartments window, make your submission dimensions 48" W x 114" H.
- If you are submitting a design to be considered for application in the Lawrence Apartments window, make your submission dimensions 120" W x 70" H.
You can also use blank digital design templates that do not feature a 2"x2" grid (your own or the ones labeled “NON-GRIDDED” in the document list above). However, if you do submit a design using the following non-gridded templates, or we find that your design does not take up most of the template space, we will install dotted bird-safe window film in a 2"x2" pattern behind your design to ensure decal effectiveness in preventing bird collisions.