Indianapolis, IN
Strategic Design
Creative Development
Production
On-Site Logistics
When Indiana University launched its Never Daunted campaign, the goal was not simply to announce an ambition, but to gather the entire university behind it. Hosted at Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis, the launch brought together more than 1,000 donors, alumni, and friends of the institution, alongside over 100 student ambassadors and all nine campus mascots, for an evening designed to feel elevated, immersive, and unmistakably IU.
Level5 partnered with IU end to end, leading discovery, creative concepting, scriptwriting, production, and on-site logistics. With only six months to plan an event of this scale, the work demanded a clear concept and disciplined execution from the first day, shaping a launch that balanced the size of the stadium with the intimacy of a single, shared celebration.
A venue built for crowds of tens of thousands posed a risk: a space that felt vast and empty rather than personal and full. Level5 guided IU through venue selection and then designed the environment to draw the room inward, using staging, lighting, and scale to make 1,000 guests feel like the center of the night. The result transformed Lucas Oil Stadium into a space that read as intimately IU.
Central to the evening were the Engagement Zones, hands-on experiences that invited guests to step inside the campaign rather than watch from their seats. IU’s concern going in was participation: would guests engage, or hang back? Level5 designed and fabricated the Zones to remove that friction, then trained more than 100 student ambassadors to help host them, turning students into the welcoming face of the campaign. The floor became the most active part of the night, with guests moving, exploring, and connecting throughout.
Level5 partnered with IU to write scripts and shape the run-of-show, then carried the program through rehearsals and live production. When program timing shifted late in the process, the team absorbed the changes without losing momentum, keeping the experience seamless for guests and leadership alike. The launch set the tone for the public phase of Never Daunted and showed what becomes possible when an entire university gathers behind a shared purpose.
