We are SO proud of our very own Maya Wilson, an 8th grader at Genesis Preparatory School. She is the Florida winner of the 2019 Doodle for Google contest! The contest, open to thousands of K-12 students throughout the United States and three territories, asked talented young artists to redesign the famous Google logo to fit the theme “When I grow up…” As the Florida winner, Maya’s winning doodle was chosen from among more than 100,000 entries.
Maya was surprised by her win in an assembly on May 21st, where she was announced the Florida winner and received a certificate and a Google ChromeBook. Maya’s doodle features an octopus playing dress up, reflecting Maya’s own diverse dreams. “When I grow up,” Maya wrote in her entry, “I hope to do so many things that it made me think of an octopus playing dress-up, using eight arms to do many jobs! It is hard to do multiple jobs with only two arms.”
All Google Doodle entries are judged based on their artistic merit, artistic skill, creativity, representation of this year’s theme, use of the letters in the Google logo, the uniqueness of the approach to the doodle, and how well the artist expresses the theme not only in the doodle but in the written statement.
Maya’s Google Doodle will now head to the finals, which involves a public vote to determine just five National finalists. The national vote will be open from June 3rd to June 7th at http://www.google.com/doodle4google/vote.html. The five national finalists will be announced in June and will be invited to visit Google headquarters in Mountain View, CA. The National Doodle for Google winner, chosen by a panel of celebrity judges that includes Jimmy Fallon and Kermit the Frog, will receive a $30,000 college scholarship. The national winner’s school will also receive a $50,000 tech package from Google to establish or improve its computer lab or tech program.