Birds will soar through Pasadena on the 2027 Cal Poly Rose Parade float

Some giant birds will make their way through the streets of Pasadena on New Year’s Day, thanks to a float being built by the Cal Poly Universities.

The student teams at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo and Cal Poly Pomona have picked Soaring As One as the theme for their 78^th Rose Parade float. It will feature a Canada goose with a 16-foot wingspan, along with other birds like a mallard duck, a great blue heron, and a kiwi bird.

The float will include more than 40,000 flowers.

It’s the only student-designed and student-built float in the parade.

Students at the two Cal Poly campuses first built a float together in 1949 and have since won more than 60 awards in the parade.