The Dean’s Excellence Fund

The Dean’s Excellence Fund provides immediate, essential support to our students. This fund serves as a vital resource to help our students and campus respond to opportunities and challenges as they occur. When you support the Dean’s Excellence Fund, you support the college's strategic vision by allowing the dean to have flexibility in directing resources to the college's priorities during this difficult time.

Which program would you like to support?

To make your support of students a reality, please email Eric Ligon, senior associate dean for Administration, Eric.Ligon@unt.edu.

Annual Event: CVAD Celebrates!

The celebration of visual arts and design students, alums, faculty, staff, board members, prospective students and friends of the college is an annual event. Sponsorships help to pay for various aspects of the event, student expenditures and some underwriting of the event. Read more about the inaugural CVAD Celebrates! event on the CVAD News and Views website.

Student Art & Design Supplies

A place for students to obtain a paintbrush, T-square or tracing paper — or any other needed art supplies that often cost each student a minimum of $100 every semester — and more depending on their program requirements. Students are welcome to give their left-over supplies or take what they need.

Software Subscription Gifts

Your gift supports a student by providing the annually required software available through a subscription to Adobe Creative Cloud. Read more about this special program for UNT students on the CVAD News and Views website. To support a student's software needs, please get in touch with Felicia Lewis, senior director for development and fundraising, at 940-369-8042.

Software for an Undergraduate for Four Years: $225
Software for a Graduate Student for Three Years: $170

CVAD Advancement Board Scholarship

The CVAD Advancement Board Undergraduate Scholarship is funded by board members and is dedicated to helping students pay for college. Kicked off by CVAD Advancement Board member Marilyn Archer with the foundational gift, this is a scholarship that will increase over time so that funds will be available in perpetuity for students with demonstrated need.

CVAD Galleries

Your gift to the Galleries benefits all three galleries in the UNT Art Building! It supports the educational mission of the College of Visual Arts and Design and the university to enrich the aesthetic environment and serve as a cultural resource for the public.

Texas Fashion Collection

The Texas Fashion Collection’s world-class holdings include nearly 20,000 historical designer garments and accessories spanning more than 250 years of fashion history! This unique archive connects researchers with a variety of dress artifacts — ranging from elite Parisian haute couture to humble paper patterns used by home sewers — each example activating the past to inspire new thoughts and new designs for the future.

Support student learning opportunities by sponsoring a $1,000 internship stipend, fund garment conservation starting at $1,500, or give any amount to offset the cost of archival boxes and mounting supplies.

Creative U, High School Summer Arts Program at UNT CVAD

Your gift of $820 supports a rising junior or senior student who has documented financial need. Read more about this CVAD’s Summer Camp program on the CVAD News and Views website.

The College of Visual Arts and Design Scholarship Fund

More than 75 percent of UNT students qualify for financial aid yearly. During these times of uncertainty, the College of Visual Arts and Design Scholarship Fund makes a difference in whether our students can continue pursuing higher education. Scholarships will genuinely make a significant impact on the lives of our students and their families. See the list of students who benefitted from the generosity of our donors: 2022-23 Continuing Student Scholarship Awards.

Specify the scholarship or area your gift will support!

Terry Barrett Scholarship Fund

Terry Barrett came to UNT in 2009 to teach art before retiring in 2014 leaving a 49-year-long career in teaching. He was a staunch advocate for the arts and art education, specifically art museum education. For decades, he conducted workshops for museum visitors and practitioners both nationally and internationally. Barrett lived a fascinating life; his autobiographical web page describes it best. To support Dr. Barrett's legacy at UNT CVAD, please make a gift to the UNT Terry Barrett Scholarship Fund.

Jaclyn Williamson Design Scholarship Fund

In memory of 2011 Communication Design alumna Jaclyn Williamson, this scholarship benefits students majoring in a CVAD Department of Design program. To donate, please follow the link to the Jaclyn Williamson information web page, the Jacyln Williamson Design Scholarship Endowment web page or contact Felicia Lewis, senior director for development and fundraising, at 940-369-8042.

Art Education

Your gift will support our undergraduate and graduate students in Art Education as they engage in their interdisciplinary exploration and engagement of local, regional, national and global research topics.

Our students conduct research in the curriculum — art content, and pedagogy, art teaching methods for pre-K through 12th-grade teachers, studio art in the community and higher education venues, and art museum education.

You can assist in their delivery of educational experiences to the Denton schools and community as part of their research and studies. Art education students also welcome your financial support for their transformative internships, study abroad experiences, and research presentations at local, national, and international arts and education conferences.

Art History

Assist our undergraduate and graduate students as they engage in their interdisciplinary exploration of local, regional, national, and global research topics. They also welcome your support of their transformative internships and study abroad experiences.

Design

Your support of our Design programs can provide a myriad of opportunities for our students, and you can designate your gift to the program of your choice! Your generosity supplements our students’ financial needs to be competitive in developing their portfolios, defraying competition entry fees, creating websites, helping with travel expenditures to attend conferences, participating in study away and abroad opportunities, buying design supplies, and conducting research.

Design Programs: Communication Design: Graphic Design and User-Experience Design, Fashion Design, Interior Design and our graduate programs, M.A. and M.F.A. in Design.

Foundations program

Assist our undergraduate students

Interdisciplinary Art and Design Studies

The Interdisciplinary Art and Design Studies, IADS, major is the fastest-growing program in CVAD. It currently has about 200 majors who specialize in one of three tracks: Open, Arts Management, or Design Management.

This degree program allows students to pursue interdisciplinarity as a field of academic inquiry, which allows students to discover the diverse cultural discourse communities and opportunities for creative inquiry specific to their professional pursuits. They often take classes in anthropology, film, communications, psychology, art history and sociology.

IADS students are encouraged to seek at least one internship at CVAD. This is an important time in which they translate their academic learning into experiential knowledge. Interning students are expected to keep a log of the 240 hours they work during the semester producing a journal of activities and reflections twice during the semester.

A majority of the IADS student internships are unpaid. CVAD strives to supply these students with approximately $2,000 for an internship semester, which translates into $8 x 15 hours/week in a 16-week semester.

Your donation will encourage students to work in this pragmatic and foundational way.

Studio Art

Your support of our Studio Art programs can provide myriad opportunities for our students, and you can designate your gift to the program of your choice! Your generosity supplements our students’ financial needs to be competitive in developing their portfolios, creating websites, helping with travel expenditures to attend conferences, participating in study away and abroad opportunities, buying art supplies, and conducting research.

Studio Programs at the B.F.A. and M.F.A. levels: Ceramics, Drawing and Painting, Metalsmithing and Jewelry, New Media Art, Photography, Printmaking, Sculpture

Annual Giving

When you give to the college annually, you make a difference in the lives of students, faculty, and staff who study, teach, and work to strengthen the college. These acts of generosity help ensure that a UNT education remains affordable and within reach for our deserving students.

Visit the Annual Recurring Gift to CVAD web page available through the Division of University Advancement.

Matching Gifts

Many employers sponsor matching gift programs and will match their employee's charitable contributions. To make your gift go even further, find out if your company has a matching gift policy by searching for your employer’s name.

Learn more on the Matching Gifts web page.

If your company is eligible, request a matching gift form from your employer and send it completed and signed with your gift. We will take care of the rest.

Estate and Planned Gifts

Donors who choose to establish planned gifts to benefit the college help secure the future of UNT.

Working with our planned-giving experts, you can make an outright gift or defer your giving through a bequest. You can even take advantage of a charitable gift annuity or other life-income gifts that enable you to establish a legacy now and still provide you with an income during your lifetime.

Learn more about Planned Giving to align your legacy with UNT today!