Toronto Exchange Application

On October 4th, 2022, I was nominated by my home university, Amsterdam University of Applied Sciences, for the Toronto Metropolitan University (formerly Ryerson) exchange program, mainly within the Creative School, during the winter semester of 2022/2023. It was an opportunity I had been looking forward to for many years.

To be selected, applicants had to design and compile an application package including various documents such as a motivation letter, CV, list of desired courses, grades, and more. As a creative student, I invested a lot of time and effort into my application to ensure it would stand out as the winning ticket to Toronto, a highly sought-after destination within the design program.

I spent weeks brainstorming and designing different versions of my application. I wanted it to have a clear theme, an impressive cover, and a compelling motivation letter. I experimented with colors, typography, layout, hierarchy, and much more. The application ended up receiving more attention than my regular schoolwork.

After many weeks of hard work, I created something I was truly proud of. I cannot share all the documents, especially those containing personal information, but I am happy to show the following pages that I created.

Personally, I think the cover was the most important part of my application. It needed to be eye-catching and set the tone for the rest of the document, especially when reviewers have to go through many applications. Featuring the CN Tower immediately made it clear which country I wanted to go to.

While most of the internal documents were boring templates provided by the university, I wanted to give my application more life. Every chapter of my document received its own carefully designed page.

Each chapter page featured a distinct building from Toronto. For example, the motivation letter chapter included an image of the Royal Ontario Museum in downtown Toronto. I spent a lot of time slicing the images in Figma and adding clean white borders around the buildings.

The courses chapter featured the Old Town Hall in downtown Toronto, and other pages included landmarks such as Rogers Centre, Union Station, City Hall, and many more.

In the end, I received the nomination and went on that exchange to Toronto, Canada. It was an amazing experience, and this project definitely helped me achieve that dream.