Singer and actress Selena Gomez will be one of the celebrity judges who helped decide on the winners of this year's Google Doodle competition, which invites students from kindergarten through 12th grade to design changes to their company's famous logo. This year's theme is I care for myself by..., which asks students to share how they take care of their bodies, minds and spirits in the face of the opportunities and challenges that each day brings.
Students can use any material or medium, as long as they can take pictures or present in two dimensions. They were also asked to write down how they created this graffiti and how it represented their inner strength.
Discussing mental health issues was one of Gomez's passions. In 2019, she founded the Rare Impact Fund and pledged to raise $100 million in mental health services for individuals in underserved communities.
"As a longtime advocate of mental health awareness, the notion that self-care is becoming part of our daily conversation gives me hope for the future," Gomez said in a statement posted via Google.
The winning entries for this contest will be displayed for a day on Google's homepage, one of Google's many graffiti, which the company often uses to enliven the bare corporate logo that usually occupies its search engine pages.
In addition to exposure, the winner will receive a $30,000 college scholarship and a $50,000 technology award for his or her school. The competition will be open to all K-12 students in the United States, Guam, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands from now until March 4.
Also joining Gomez on the guest jury were filmmaker and mental health advocate Elyse Fox. She is the creator of Sad Girls Club, a nonprofit dedicated to removing mental health stigma.
Fox said she likes the theme of this year's competition because sometimes people may think it's selfish to care about themselves, but instead, it's important for us to prioritize being the best version we want to be." ”
The panelist is Juliana Urtubey, a co-teacher of special education in Las Vegas and a 2021 National Teacher of the Year who advocates for a happy education for all. "I teach my students how to acknowledge and regulate their emotions, and because their relationships and interactions with family, friends, and community members can have a significant impact on their health and well-being, we always talk about our emotions in a community context."