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The One Club for Creativity kicked off Creative Week 2026 by honoring winning schools and students from 39 countries in the 2026 Young Ones Student Awards ceremony at Sony Hall in New York.

Based on cumulative points for all awards won by a school’s students in this year’s competition, School of Visual Arts New York was crowned 2026 Young Ones School of the Year. Overall, SVA collected two Golds, seven Silver, nine Bronze, 47 Merits, and four Portfolio wins.

Rounding out the top-five ranked schools, in order, are Savannah College of Art and Design Savannah, Filmakademie Baden-Württemberg Ludwigsburg, ArtCenter College of Design Pasadena, and Miami Ad School Madrid.

The One Club Global Creative College Rankings for 2026 can be viewed here. An archive of all 2026 Young Ones winning entries can be viewed here.

In memory of industry leader Ari Weiss, who passed away last year, The One Club for Creativity announced the first winner of its new annual Ari Weiss Award, honoring the top scoring student in the Young Ones Portfolio competition.

The inaugural recipient of the award is Carlos Mario Rodriguez, a student at ArtCenter College of Design Savannah and Miami Ad School New York.

Weiss, whose storied career included top creative roles at Cliff Freeman and Partners, BBDO, Wieden+Kennedy, 180LA, Goodby Silverstein & Partners, BBH, DDB, and founding of Quality Experience, had a close association with the program as a Young Ones Pencil winner at The One Show in 2000. His extraordinary talents also led him to win that year’s live creative challenge, where students were tasked with delivering a brief during Creative Week.

Young Ones is one of the world’s most comprehensive and acclaimed competitive showcases for advertising, digital communication, and design students. The program offers four separate competitions:

Young Ones ADC, offering students the chance to earn an ADC Cube by competing in many of the same disciplines and categories as the prestigious ADC Annual Awards;
Young Ones One Show Brief and Client Pitch competitions, which tasks a team of students with creating work for a specific client with the chance to earn a One Show Pencil, with top entrants having the opportunity to pitch the actual client;
Young Ones Portfolio competition, where students submit 6-15 projects and have it judged as a representation of their entire body of work by industry professionals;
Young Ones TDC, where student entries in typography, lettering, and type design can win Type-High awards, or Merits from the Type Directors Club, part of The One Club for Creativity.

Top global winners in the four 2026 Young Ones competitions, as selected by the global jury, are as follows.

Young Ones ADC 2026 (25 Gold Cubes, 40 Silver, 71 Bronze, 293 Merit)

Filmakademie Baden-Württemberg Ludwigsburg was the top YO ADC Gold Cube winner with six. Four of the Golds were for “Anytime, Anywhere”, one each in Advertising: Branded Content/Entertainment – TV/Film/Video – Short Form; Motion/Film Craft: Cinematography; Motion/Film Craft: Editing; and Motion/Film Craft: Use of Music / Sound.

Their two other Golds were for “Peas” in Advertising: Craft in Video – Direction, and “The Nymph” in Advertising: Art Direction – Motion.

Ming Chuan University Taipei had two ADC Gold Cube wins, one each for “Solstice Protocol :Base 2.0” in Architecture/Interior/Environmental Design: Landscape Design, and “鏟子的聲音” (“The Sound of a Shovel”) in Brand/Communication Design: Posters or Print.

Also with two Golds was School of Visual Arts New York, one each for “Dept. of Misplaced Realities” in Brand/Communication Design: Branding – Branding Systems/Identities – Integrated, and “Muddy” in Illustration: Print.

Young Ones One Show 2026 Brief and Client Pitch Competitions (8 Gold Pencils, 14 Silver, 21 Bronze, 140 Merit; 1 Client Pitch winner)

This year’s Young Ones One Show competition involved working on briefs from sponsors Best Buy, Clash of Clans, Google, Philips Sonicare, Verizon, Walmart, and Whiskas.

Miami Ad School Madrid led the way with three YO One Show Brief Gold Pencils, one each for “Sonikart” for Sonicare: Gaming”, “Dorm Style Blender” for Walmart: Creative Use of AI, and “Dorm Style Blender – Walmart” for Walmart: Interactive, Online, & Mobile.

With two YO One Show Brief Gold Pencils was Redhook School Curitiba for “The Contract”, one each for Verizon: Creator Content & Social Media and Verizon: Radio & Audio.

One YO One Show Brief Gold Pencil each went to Korea Institute of Creative Seoul with Hanyang University ERICA Ansan-si and School of Visual Arts New York “UncensHERship” for Google: Creator Content & Social Media; Openlearn Academy Fort Lee “The Wave of Hope” for Google: Radio & Audio; and Savannah College of Art and Design Savannah “Google Prism” for Google: Creative Use of AI.

In the Young Ones One Show Client Pitch Competition, where students present their ideas to a jury including top brands who sponsored this year’s program, a team from FIT Advertising & Digital Design New York made up of Thalia Merino and Vashtie Persaud won for “Clash of Netflix” on behalf of Clash of Clans.

Young Ones 2026 Portfolio Competition (26 winners from 13 schools)

Savannah College of Art and Design Savannah led in the Young Ones 2026 Portfolio Competition with seven wins, going to students Gage Bowman, Duygu Lougee, Junjie Pan, Wildy Riftian, Jieru Tang, Xavier Thompson, Menghan Wang.

ArtCenter College of Design Pasadena had four YO Portfolio winners for students Bamba Kimball, Yeon Ko, Daria Maximova, and Cheryl “Wenjing” Xia.

Also with four is School of Visual Arts New York for students Yonghwa Cha, Joanne Choi, Dyn Kim, and Sophia Lefebure.

Young Ones TDC 2026 competition (5 Gold, 8 Silver, 21 Bronze, 34 Merit)

After many decades of awarding only certificates to all winners, this marks the first year the Type Directors Club, part of The One Club for Creativity, will present Gold, Silver, and Bronze Type-High awards for its annual TDC competition.

There were five Young Ones TDC Student Type-High Gold winners this year:

Carnegie Mellon University Pittsburgh for “Beads” in Type Design: Text + Display Typefaces – Variable Font
Class Tao Shanghai for “Echo Music Party” in Communication Design: Other
Elisava School of Design and Engineering Barcelona for “Swing Display” in Lettering: Digital/Technology – Coding/Scripting
Maryland Institute College of Art Baltimore “Gallery Of Decay” in Lettering: Digital/Technology – Coding/Scripting
Rhode Island School of Design Providence “Gossip” in Type Design: Specialized Typefaces + Non-standard Formats – Emoji/Symbol Typeface

The three top entrants in Young Ones TDC 2026 also receive cash awards, as follows:

$ 1,000: Athang Samant of Maryland Institute College of Art in Baltimore for “Gallery of Decay” in Lettering: Digital / Technology – Coding / Scripting
$ 500: Weiran Liang of Class Tao in Shanghai for “Echo Music Party” in Communication Design: Other
$ 300: Jasmin Palermo of Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh for “Beads” in Type Design: Text + Display Typefaces – Variable Font

The complete archive of all 2026 Young Ones Student Awards winners can be viewed here.

Young Ones is celebrated annually with the goal of inspiring and nurturing the next generation of advertising professionals. Events each year during Creative Week present an invaluable opportunity for college students and graduating seniors to network with top agency professionals, receive feedback on their portfolios, experience the industry’s best work, and more.

Creative Week 2026

The Young Ones 2026 Student Awards is the first event of Creative Week 2026, taking place May 11-15 in New York.

Now in its 17th year, Creative Week is a premier annual gathering for the advertising and design industries to come together and celebrate the creative excellence showcased in The One Club’s leading global awards shows: ADC Annual Awards, The One Show, and Young Ones Student Awards.

Other Creative Week 2026 programming includes The One Club AI Creative Challenge, exclusive Executive Creative Summit 2026, Client Pitch Competition, in person and virtual Portfolio Reviews, Type Directors Club TDC Lettering Walk, and informative daily Morning Buzz panels.

For details and to register, please visit the Creative Week 2026 website.

ABOUT THE ONE CLUB FOR CREATIVITY

The One Club for Creativity – home of The One Show, ADC Annual Awards, Art Directors Club of Europe (ADCE) awards, ONE Asia Creative Awards, Type Directors Club TDC competition and scholarships, ADC Young Guns, Young Ones Student Awards, Next Creative Leaders, ONE School, ONE Creator Lab, Where Are All The Black People conference and career fair, Portfolio Night, Creative Week, and more – is the world’s foremost non-profit organization whose mission is to support and celebrate the success of the global creative community. Revenue generated from entries to its global awards shows goes back into the industry to fund programs that support industry access, creative education, professional development, and enhancement of creative careers around the world.