Academy Names 14 Winners of 2025 Student Academy Awards

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has named 14 winners of the 52nd Student Academy Awards, chosen from more than 3,100 submissions representing nearly 1,000 colleges and universities worldwide. Winners will be honored Oct. 6 at the Ziegfeld Ballroom in New York, in a ceremony staged during the New York Film Festival and presented in partnership with Rolex.

The international student competition, founded in 1972, has served as a launchpad for filmmakers including Patricia Cardoso, Pete Docter, Spike Lee, Patricia Riggen and Robert Zemeckis. Alumni of the awards have gone on to collect 69 Oscar nominations and 15 wins.

This year’s slate features first-time honors for institutions in Denmark, France, Poland, Slovakia and the U.K. Schools making their debut include the University of Copenhagen, Paris’ Gobelins, Poland’s Krzysztof Kieślowski Film School, Slovakia’s Academy of Performing Arts in Bratislava, the London College of Communication and the University of the West of England Bristol.

In the alternative/experimental category, the Academy singled out Mati Granica’s “flower_gan” (London College of Communication), USC’s Xindi Zhang for “The Song of Drifters” and Copenhagen’s Vega Moltke-Leth with “Without Perfection.”

Animation prizes went to Gobelins’ Sofiia Chuikovska, Loïck du Plessis D’Argentré and Maud Le Bras for “The Shyness of Trees,” Tobias Eckerlin of Film Academy Baden-Württemberg for “A Sparrow’s Song” and Lucas Ansel of Rhode Island School of Design for “The 12 Inch Pianist.”

The documentary winners included “Confession” by Slovakia’s Rebeka Bizubová (Academy of Performing Arts in Bratislava), “I Remember” by NYU’s Jane Deng and “Tides of Life” by Tatiana McCabe of the University of the West of England Bristol.

In narrative, top honors went to Israel’s Meyer Levinson-Blount for “Butcher’s Stain,” Jan Saczek of Krzysztof Kieślowski Film School for “Dad’s Not Home” and Columbia University’s Zefan Wang for “Kubrick, Like I Love You.”

Gold, silver and bronze placements in the four award categories will be announced at the October ceremony, where winners will also take part in educational and networking events with Academy members. All honored films are eligible for Oscar consideration in the animated short, live action short and documentary short categories.