Florida teen receives $30,000 scholarship after winning 2022 Doodle for Google nationals

A high school student from Florida has won the 14th annual Doodle for Google National Competition.

Sophie Araque-Liu, a 16-year-old junior at Martin County High School, was named the state winner in Florida last May before she was announced as the national winner on Tuesday.

“Doodle for Google” is an annual competition where K-12 students across the U.S. create their own versions of the Google logo.

The theme for the 2022 Doodle for Google competition was “I care for myself by…” Among this year’s judges were star Selena Gomez, filmmaker/activist Elyse Fox and 2021’s Teacher of the Year Juliana Urtubey.

Gomez even surprised Araque-Liu with a Zoom call to deliver the news that she won.

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Araque-Liu’s winning entry, titled “Not alone,” answered the prompt by writing “I care for myself by accepting others’ care for me.” The artwork was featured on Google’s homepage and the new tab page in Chrome on Aug. 16.

According to the teen, her artwork represents herself hugging her mother. She explained in her submission packet that she often struggles to “shoulder a burden on my own and forget that I have so many people, like my mom, who care about me and want to help.”

“Opening up and letting others support me not only relieves my stress, [but] it [also] lets me tackle things I could never do on my own,” she added.

The student has been submitting her artwork to the competition for the past three years and was finally chosen as a finalist for the first time this year.

For her win, Araque-Liu received a $30,000 college scholarship from Google, and her school was given a $50,000 technology award.

Featured Image via Google

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