On February 22, 2025, I participated in the “Gordon College CCS Tech Fest 2025” held at Marikit Park, Olongapo City. This significant event brought together a diverse audience including students, technology enthusiasts, and esports competitors for a comprehensive day of educational sessions, competitive gaming, and community celebration. As a Gordon College student, I served on the creatives committee with responsibility for designing all promotional materials and posters utilized across various social media platforms and during the event itself.
The Tech Fest featured multiple components including technical presentations from industry speakers, competitive esports events highlighted by a League of Legends tournament, and various technology-focused activities. Beyond serving as a celebration of technology and gaming culture, the event functioned as a fundraising initiative with proceeds designated for the planned renovation of our department’s future Mac Lab.
On the event day, I unexpectedly took on additional responsibilities with the technical committee due to staffing shortages. Having brought my laptop and being available to assist, I helped organize speaker presentations and edited the audiovisual showcase featuring highlights from the League of Legends tournament. The event concluded with recognition ceremonies for all competition winners and successfully achieved its established fundraising targets.
My experience on the creatives committee emphasized the critical importance of establishing clear design concepts and guidelines during the early planning stages. Our team encountered challenges maintaining visual consistency across promotional materials due to insufficient clarification of the guiding design concept. This experience demonstrated that even skilled designers require a unified vision to create cohesive marketing assets that effectively represent an event’s identity.
The complex scheduling requirements of committee members presented significant workflow challenges. I learned that effective time management and coordination become increasingly crucial when team members have varying availability patterns. Despite these constraints, we successfully delivered engaging content for our audience, highlighting the value of persistence and adaptability when operating under pressure with limited resources.
Being suddenly recruited into the technical committee on the event day provided valuable lessons regarding flexibility in event management. This unexpected role transition demonstrated how versatile skill sets prove invaluable during large-scale events. The capacity to rapidly adapt to new responsibilities, such as organizing presentations and editing video content with minimal notice, emerged as an essential competency I hadn’t fully appreciated prior to this experience.
For future events, I could implement a more structured approach to creative development by establishing a comprehensive design guide at the very beginning of the planning process. This would encompass color palettes, typography standards, image treatment guidelines, and overall aesthetic direction. Such documentation would maintain consistency even when different team members work on various materials across different timeframes and under tight deadlines.
The cross-committee experience gained could enhance overall event planning through increased collaboration between different functional teams early in the process. For example, technical and creative teams could hold regular coordination meetings to ensure promotional materials accurately reflect technical aspects of the event and to develop contingency plans for potential role adjustments on the event day.
The fundraising success of the Tech Fest provides a replicable model for addressing other departmental needs. By integrating educational content with entertainment and competitive elements, we created an event that generated willing financial support. This approach could be adapted for various academic initiatives, potentially establishing a sustainable funding framework for ongoing departmental improvements beyond the Mac Lab renovation.
Despite our challenges with design consistency, our creative team successfully produced visually compelling promotional materials that effectively attracted attendees to the event. Our social media content generated interest not only among Gordon College students but also from technology enthusiasts and gaming communities throughout Olongapo City. The diverse designs we created, though lacking perfect consistency, effectively highlighted the various engaging aspects of the Tech Fest.
The collaborative spirit demonstrated when team members assisted wherever needed was remarkable. When the technical committee experienced staffing shortages, I immediately utilized my laptop to help organize presentations and edit tournament highlights without hesitation. This cooperative approach and flexibility from all committee members preserved operational continuity despite behind-the-scenes challenges.
Most importantly, we successfully achieved our fundraising objective for the Mac Lab renovation. Witnessing the tangible outcomes of our collective efforts provided all participants with a genuine sense of accomplishment. The dynamic atmosphere created by uniting diverse audiences – from dedicated technology students to casual gamers and community members – generated an energetic environment that received numerous positive comments.
While the Tech Fest achieved its objectives, our creative team would benefit from establishing a defined design system at the planning phase outset. Early consensus on color schemes, typography, and overall visual identity for all materials would be valuable. Implementing regular design review sessions would enhance coordination, especially given our challenging schedules. This approach would resolve consistency issues and elevate the professional quality of our promotional materials for future events.
The impromptu committee reassignments highlighted the need for improved contingency planning. My unexpected assistance to the technical team on event day, while ultimately successful, was not optimal. For subsequent Tech Fest events, we should designate backup personnel familiar with each committee’s core responsibilities. Implementing brief cross-training sessions prior to the event would prepare team members to transition between roles seamlessly when necessary.
Looking forward, we could enhance the Tech Fest by expanding successful elements and introducing additional technology competitions beyond gaming. These expansions would attract broader audiences and potentially increase fundraising capacity for future departmental initiatives, building upon our successful Mac Lab renovation campaign.