Doodle 4 Google Contest: Theme, Dates, Prizes, Past Winners

Each year Google invites students from kindergarten through grade 12 across the country to try their hand at creating one of the Google Doodles that appear on the homepage of the site. The winning designer gets prizes, scholarships and 24 hours of fame on Google.com.

Winners are chosen based on their artistic skill, their creativity and the communication of the theme, according to Google. Then the winners are grouped and judged in five different grade groups, those groups are Kindergarten through grade three, grades four and five, grades six and seven, grades eight and nine and then grades 10 through 12.

The finalists are then chosen by state and territory, then the national finalists are chosen from that group, one in each grade group and then the national winner is chosen from that final group of five.

Theme

The theme for the 2018 Doodle 4 Google contest is “What inspires me,” according to Google. Each doodle must spell out the word “Google” and the letters have to be incorporated into the design.

Prizes

The National Winner will win $30,000 in scholarship money for college and another $50,000 in technology for their school or non-profit organization. The National Winner also gets a trip to Google Headquarters, a chance to work with the Google Doodle team to animate their doodle, and lots of free stuff like hardware and swag from Google.

The four National Finalists also get some scholarship money for college, $5,000, and the free stuff from Google as well as the trip to the California Headquarters.

State and territory winners will get some free stuff from Google as well and their Doodles will be features in the Doodle 4 Google gallery, according to Google.

Dates

The contest is now open and those who wish to participate have until March 2 at 8 p.m. PT to submit their Doodles.

Past Winners

The winner in 2017 was a 10th grade student from Connecticut named Sarah Harrison, she created a Doodle that showed people of all races, abilities, genders, religions and sexualities embracing and smiling. The theme was “What I see for the future,” and her Doodle showed an inclusive future. All of the prior Doodle 4 Google winning designs are available online here.