Category Archives: Student Blog

Google news and updates especially for students

Contest Spotlight: ‘Paying It Forward’ in honor of Black History Month

BGN_Friday Group 01.jpg


Are you a social change agent in your community or know someone who is?


If so, we invite you to join Google’s third annual “Pay It Forward” Contest.


At Google, we value diversity and inclusion, and we support individuals who do the same. Our Staffing Programs team is celebrating diversity and honoring Black History Month by inviting student organizations to showcase how they have positively impacted the Black community. We’re seeking US-based student organizations recognized and approved by their college, university, or business school that have organized service or philanthropic support for their community to share the impact they are making. Examples include volunteering at an after school program, fundraising for an initiative or starting a community project.


Last year, we showcased Elizabeth Davis, Robin McKinnie, Maurita Ament and Michael Tubbs who collectively are advancing the lives of hundreds of people across the country through their social impact work.


The deadline to enter the contest is February 29, 2016, at 11:59 pm PST. Submissions will be judged by a team of Googlers, who will be assessing the innovation, scale and the short- and long-term effects of your impact. Winning organizations will have the opportunity to present their work at the Google headquarters in Mountain View, CA, and have their work showcased on the Google Student Blog.


To both enter the competition and get more info, visit our 2016 Black History Month website.


We look forward to seeing your submission!
THe Google Staffing Programs team

Managing your time effectively in the #AdMobSAC16

Here are some pointers for managing your time as your team gets started  in the #AdMobSAC16.

  • January to February:
    • Organize your team; if you haven’t found a team, utilize Collabfinder to ensure you find the best team possible.
    • Assign tasks and deliverables for people according to their strengths.
    • Brainstorm your ideas for your app.
    • Put together your strategy for project completion.

Tip: This is also a good time to familiarize yourself with the AdMob app policy, which can be found in the AdMob Help Center.

  • March: As springtime approaches, your team should be in the heart of building the application. Focus on:
    • Design work and developing the basic elements of the app.
    • Aim to have a working prototype by the end of the month.
    • Don’t forget to integrate AdMob ads into your app. This is a key requirement.
    • Open it up for testing among a small group of trusted developers who are willing to provide detailed feedback.
    • Start thinking your app’s promotional strategy.

Tip: A large portion of #AdMobSAC16 is scored on the success of your app (such as the number of downloads and ratings - check the judging criteria for the full details) - you will need to give yourself enough time to put effort into promoting your app.

  • April:
    • Complete final testing and make refinements based on user feedback. Your app should be high quality, and part of that is responding to user suggestions.
    • Release your app on an app store and start promoting it.
    • Remember to submit your app and AdMob account ID to AdMob so we know you’ve built it.

  • May to June:
    • Continue promoting your app. Think about creative ways to do it.
    • Now will be the time to start readying your business report, which is due on June 28, 2016 by 5:00PM PST. The Challenge website already has a recommended template on it.
    • Remember, your project will be reviewed by a panel of app experts from Google, so your business report will need to be thorough and of professional-level quality.

Be sure to visit the AdMob website to register. Follow us on AdMob G+ and Twitter and keep an update on #AdMobSAC16 too, for regular updates on the challenge.


Posted by Jeff Miner

AdMob Student App Challenge Team

We are excited to announce that Professor and Student Registrations for the 2016 Google Online Marketing Challenge (GOMC 2016) are now open.

The Google Online Marketing Challenge, now in its ninth year, is an annual global online marketing competition for students from higher education institutions around the world. Student teams develop and run an online advertising campaign using Google AdWords and/or Google+ for a real business or non-profit organization of their choice, using a US $250 budget provided by Google. An independent GOMC Panel of Academics, along with our own team, review the campaigns and select winning teams based on the success of their campaign and the quality of their competition reports.
Why GOMC?
  • GOMC provides a unique, hands-on learning experience by integrating a real-world business partner and budget into the classroom.
  • Students get a chance to support their local community by working with a non-profit, and the opportunity to win donations from a total pool of US $30,000.
  • GOMC enables professors to provide their students with an engaging and innovative in-class experience, which provides real-world impact and grading material.
  • Great prizes for global and regional winners of the challenge, including trips to Google offices, digital devices and more.

To learn about the impact of the GOMC, check out this video.

What’s next?
In order for a student team to participate in the competition, they need to have their professor register first. Professors can register from January 26th until April 6th, 2016, and students can register from January 26th until April 20th, 2016.

For more information, please visit www.google.com/onlinechallenge. To stay informed about GOMC, add our Google+ Page to your circles: google.com/+googleonlinemarketingchallenge.

Here’s your chance to make a global impact!

The Google Online Marketing Challenge Team

Not your average app building competition: The AdMob Student App Challenge


Did you know that there are more mobile devices than people? In 2014, there were 7.4BN* devices and an estimated 7.2 billion people. Mobile is quickly becoming the most popular way to get online, even exceeding the time spent on desktop computers.** This has contributed greatly to the growth of the app ecosystem, with consumers spending on average 37 hours a month*** on mobile apps. As apps are becoming more prominent in our everyday lives, it’s more important now than ever to learn app development.


That’s why we’re launching the second AdMob Student App Challenge, an app building competition open to students around the world. If you’re a student who loves to code or has a great idea for a mobile app, this is your chance to build an app, learn how to make money from it, and win awesome prizes. The prizes will include a week-long trip to San Francisco and a visit to the Googleplex.



To win the challenge, you’ll need to build a great app (either Android or iOS) and create a sound business plan that shows how you managed the project, gained users, and leveraged AdMob to make money. The contest will be judged by a panel of app industry leaders. To learn more the judges, visit here.

The winning team will receive:

  • An all expenses paid, week-long trip to San Francisco, including a visit to the Googleplex in Mountain View, CA
  • A featured spot on the Google Play Store
  • A promotional video starring you and your app
  • A healthy amount of Google schwag, including a new Google device

Last year’s global winner was Phani Gaddipati, who created Stacks Flashcards, an app that lets people create electronic flashcards on any subject, quiz themselves and analyze their performance. Check out his video to learn more.

In addition to one overall winner, the finalist from each of the four global regions (North America, Latin America, Europe Middle East & Africa, and Asia Pacific) will receive Google devices and see their app featured on the AdMob website.

The challenge starts today, and you’ll have until June 28, 2016 to build your winning app. Be sure to visit the AdMob website to learn more and register. Follow us on AdMob G+ and Twitter and keep an update on #AdMobSAC16 too, for regular updates on the challenge. .

Best of luck -- we can’t wait to see what you build!

Posted by Henry Wang
Product Marketing, AdMob



*Cisco, Cisco Visual Networking Index: Global Mobile Data Traffic Forecast Update 2014–2019 White Paper, February 2015 **eMarketer, US Time Spent with Media, October 2014 ***Nielsen, Smartphones: So Many Apps, So Much Time, July 2014


Applications are now open for Google’s 2016 Computer Science Summer Institute and 2016

We are now accepting applications for the 2016 Computer Science Summer Institute, as well as the 2016 Generation Google Scholarship. Learn more about both programs below and apply today!


What
The Computer Science Summer Institute (CSSI) is a three-week introduction to computer science for graduating high school seniors with a passion for technology. Students will learn programming fundamentals directly from Google engineers, get an inside look at some of Google's most exciting, emerging technologies, and even design and develop their very own application with fellow participants.

The Generation Google Scholarship helps aspiring computer scientists from underrepresented groups excel in technology and become leaders in the field. Selected students will receive 10,000 USD (for those studying in the US) or 5,000 CAD (for those studying in Canada) for the 2016-2017 school year. As part of the scholarship, current high school seniors who are entering their first year of university in Fall 2016 will be required to attend CSSI in the summer of 2016.

Where & When
We offer two types of sessions at CSSI: day-camp and residential. Our day camps will take place in Chicago, IL, Mountain View, CA, and New York City, NY. Our residential camps will take place in Cambridge, MA and Seattle, WA. To learn more, please visit our website.

Who
We are looking for students eager to spend a few weeks immersed in the Google life -- tackling interesting technical problems, working collaboratively and having fun. The program is committed to addressing diversity in the field of computer science and is open to all qualified high school seniors who intend to major in computer science at a four year university in the US or Canada.

Why
Google is committed to increasing the enrollment and retention of students in the field of computer science. These programs offer an intensive, interactive and fun experience that seeks to inspire the tech leaders and innovators of tomorrow. We want students to leave empowered, heading into their first year of college armed with technical skills and a unique learning experience that can only be found at Google. We aim to expose selected students to key programming concepts while enabling them to tackle the challenging problems in CS by creating a safe, comfortable environment to learn, play, break, and build.

Apply
Visit our Google for Education website for more information and to apply. The application deadline is March 3, 2016. Final decisions will be announced in early May.

Questions?

Give us a shout at [email protected] or [email protected].

Celebrating Android app creators

Ever wonder what makes an app great? After completing Udacity's Developing Android Apps course, these students created winning apps as voted on by their peers and Google engineers. Check out their work below and consider creating your own Android app today!
Ravi explains his app to Google engineers.
App Award: “Most Creative”
App:  Mozart's Masterpiece
Creator: Ravi Srinivasan (junior at Virginia Tech)
Background: The idea of the “Mozart’s Masterpiece” app came from Ravi’s love of piano playing (he’s played since he was six!). He wanted to create something that combined his interest in music and programming. The app is comprised of a mini keyboard where users can play a tune and see if the app can guess the song. Ravi said, “There are apps out there that teach users how to play, but I wanted to create an app that was a game for pianists.”
Challenges: Ravi shared that it was difficult to decide what the UI would look like and noted that the sound detection was also no easy feat.

Here we have Dhruv and Brennan.
App Award: “Engineer's’ Choice”
App:  IVO
Creators: Brennan McConnell (junior at University of Colorado Boulder) and Dhruv Diddi (junior at University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign)
Background: Dhruv told us, “Brennan came up with the idea of having an app which locks social media to a geographic location and I was instantly interested in working on it. We took a few days to come up with a draft for the application (UI, methods to implement, frameworks to use) and settled on the name IVO (an appropriate acronym for "In Vicinity Of").”  IVO is a social media app that allows users to post a message or picture in a given location using geocaching. Users in the future can look up the the location and see past photos and messages about the area. The social aspect comes from a feature that lets the users like and comment on the posts.
Challenges: Aside from the technical skills required for making such a complex app, such as learning Java, developing a greater understanding of Android’s framework, and working with different APIs, the team also had to think about scaling the app to thousands of users.

Francesca, Christina, Jonah, and Daisy show that their app can be used across devices.
App Award: “People's Favorite”
App:  Glance
Creators:  Jonah Sterling (sophomore at University of Kentucky), Francesca Bueti (sophomore at Stevens Institute of Technology), Daisy Zhang (sophomore at Vanderbilt University), and Christina Tobias (sophomore at Syracuse University)
Background: This team created an app, Glance, that connects all of a user’s social media accounts together and uses intricate algorithms to analyze what posts are most meaningful and relevant to the user. Christina said, “We thought that with everyone’s busy lives, we could help take out some of the clutter from their social media by finding who their top friends for each social media platform are and combining all these posts into one feed.“ Moreover, in an effort to make the app even more user-friendly, the app can be used across all devices.
Challenges: The team agreed that developing new technical skills, like learning the fundamentals of creating an Android app, was the biggest takeaway for them. But most importantly, they gained a better understanding of what it’s like to collaborate on code. According to Daisy, “This was also my first time working in a team remotely, so I learned a lot about keeping up with everyone and making sure everyone was doing their part. I also learned that you don’t write the cleanest code at 3 in the morning, but you are super productive at that hour.”

Check out the app winners! Left to right: Dhruv, Brennan, Ravi, Christina, Daisy, Francesca, and Jonah.
Congratulations to these winners! We can’t wait to see what you come up with next.


To learn more about ways to boost your computer science skills, visit the Google Student Programs website.

Hash Code signups open for students and professionals across Europe, the Middle East and Africa

Think you could come up with a way to optimize Internet coverage for Project Loon balloons? Or how about routing Google Street View cars through a busy city?





Step into the shoes of a Google engineer and tackle similar challenges during Hash Code, a team-based programming competition for students and professionals (18+) across Europe, the Middle East and Africa organized by Google. You pick your team and programming language, we pick a real-life engineering problem to solve. Are you up for the challenge?


The competition is divided into two stages:
  • an Online Qualification Round on 11th February at 18:30 CET
For this round, your team can participate from wherever you’d like, including one of our Hash Code hubs. Hubs allow for teams in the same location (eg. city or university) to compete side-by-side in a more fun and exciting environment.
  • a Final Round on 19th March
Top scoring teams from the Online Qualification Round will be invited to Google Paris to compete in the Final Round of the competition.


Learn more and sign up today at g.co/hashcode!
Posted by Jessica Safir, University Programs

EMEA 2015 Android Camp: A reflection

In early August, 23 students from 20 universities had the opportunity to attend the fourth annual Google European Android Camp in London. Students who arrived from 14 different countries were invited to a jam-packed week of Android learning and development, career panels, tech talks, social activities as well as a 24-hour Hackathon. The goal of the event, held in the Google office, was to give students a chance to learn, practice and have fun while developing applications for the Android operating system with the support of Google engineers. The theme for the week was Create the Good in Your Community, with the winning team designing an app ‘Red Paw’ to help notify animal shelters about strays and ensure they are re-homed.

We asked the winning team to tell us about their experience at Android Camp - congratulations once again!
Left to right: Carolina Sartorius, Lund University, MSc in Computer Science and Engineering
Maria Priisalu/ Lund University, MSc in Computer Science
Damask Talary-Brown, University of Bath, BSc in Computer Science
Lavinia Mariana Damian, Alexandru Ioan Cuza University, BSc in Computer Science
Marija Čivović, University of Belgrade, BSc in Computer hardware and Informatics.

What was the highlight of Android Camp for you?
Lavinia: For me, the highlight of Android camp was the Hackathon and especially our final presentation when every team got to showcase their app. It was inspiring to see the progress everyone made in 1 week and all of those ideas coming to life in just 24 hours of coding.
Marija: When you had such an amazing week, it's not fair to have to choose the best part of it. But let's say Scavenger Hunt - an amazing sightseeing adventure with the girls from my team that I met the night before.
Carolina: The highlight of the Camp was to meet the other campers. It was very inspiring to meet so many talented, enthusiastic and driven people.
Damask: For me, the last few hours of the hackathon were the highlight because they were the culmination of all the learning and designing we’d been doing throughout the week. There was definitely an overwhelming sense of pride and mutual respect (and exhaustion!) amongst us as the 24 hours drew to a close, and it was a fantastic feeling.

Do you think Android Camp helped you build or develop any skills?
Maria: Although I had some previous knowledge in Android programming, Camp taught me a lot of specific details about Android that I wouldn’t have learned otherwise.
Damask: I didn’t have any experience with the Android SDK before Camp, so it really was a crash course in that respect. The sheer amount of content we managed to fit in was crazy; from networking and database integration to interface design.
Carolina: Aside from developing my Android skills, I also developed skills such as pitching, gaining confidence and be able to collaborate with different people.
Lavinia: Of course!, I knew nothing about Android programming before attending this camp so I'm still amazed at how I managed together with my team to finish an app from scratch. I think the whole context of the camp helped me with the way I focus and organize my time. I improved both my attention span and my team working skills.

What was your favorite session?
Lavinia: I enjoyed the material design class the most and I found it to be really interesting. Of the other activities, the "Engineer Panel" was my favorite. I loved how the participants were so willing to share their experiences at Google with us and give us so much advice advice as our seniors in the industry. It was really inspiring!
Damask: I loved the UX session, because the use case and persona design we did helped us design meaningful interactions between our app and its typical users. The personas we created also ended up playing a starring role in our final presentation, which humanised the problem we were trying to solve and gave us the opportunity to have some fun with it.
Marija: My favorite session was the Firebase: Server Session. We had so much fun with trying to build  a chat app. I also got to learn a lot about data storage.
Carolina: My favorite session was the Google Card Game night ‘Launch and Iterate.’ It was a fun challenge to get four people with strong will to collaborate and try to win.

How do you think Android Camp will help you further your academic career?
Maria: It has given me more confidence in my technical problem solving skills and programming.
Damask: Android Camp has cemented my interest in UX and Interaction Design, which will almost certainly impact my dissertation and final year choices.
Marija: I hope I can take a Mobile programming class, specifically because the Camp gave me an excellent base of knowledge that will help me excel.
Carolina: Android Camp gave me a self-confidence boost. The ability to believe in yourself is a important factor in academic success.

What are your next steps?
Damask: I’m on a year in industry right now, so my plan is to hopefully secure an internship doing something cool for next summer before I head back to university to start my final year. In my free time, I definitely have a few app ideas I can start working on!
Marija: I'm introducing the app we made to people, So far,I’ve received good feedback :). Camp definitely gave me a new perspective.
Carolina: My next steps are to finish my degree and decide what I want to do for a living.
Lavinia:  For now, I have 1 year left of my Master studies and after that I'm planning to apply for a University Graduate position at Google. Also, I'm thinking of working more on our app from Android Camp. I would love to see the Red Paw app released one day and be used by millions of people.
Maria: I will finish my Master of Computer Science and Engineering at Lund.


Read more student testimonials in our ‘ Android Camp Diary’ G+ series. For more information on opportunities at Google, please visit Google Students. For more updates, please stay tuned on the Google Students Blog.

The search for Ireland’s coders of tomorrow begins

Google is once again searching for Ireland’s coders and computer scientists of tomorrow, with the return of the Call to Code competition. Call to Code (www.calltocode.ie) is one way we’re aiming to help get younger generations interested in Computer Science. We want to inspire Irish teenagers to experience the power of code and to develop the skills needed for future careers in the tech industry, as well as many other diverse fields such as music, crime scene investigation, fashion, farming, government, design, medicine or film, to name a few.
logo-octopus.png
Who can take part?
The competition is open to all post-primary students in Ireland, aged 13-18. Students will participate in weekly practice challenges to learn the basics of coding and develop computational thinking skills. They’ll then have the opportunity to compete in an online contest, which includes logic puzzles and programming tasks suited for all levels, but qualifying will more than likely require some programming skill so get practising early!

How does it work?
The first phase of Call to Code is entirely online, and if you are an eligible student, we want you to participate! Once you have signed up through a teacher or individually, you will be able to look through resources to learn the basics of coding, sharpen your logical thinking skills, and get ready to compete in Round 1 of the competition on 25th November. With teacher support, you can develop your computer science skills during class, you can get a group together to create lunchtime Call to Code clubs, or you can practice on your own at home--anything goes! Then, on 25th November, participants will login anytime during the 24 hour period to solve logic puzzles and coding challenges set by Google engineers. On 9th December, 20 finalists from each cycle will take part in a nail-biting code-off at Google’s Dublin HQ for the chance to win some great prizes.  

How do I sign up?
Teachers are asked to get involved, register their school and sign their students up to participate. Teachers play a vital role in computer science education, and Call to Code is designed to support them in their efforts to inspire and educate our next generation of technologists.

Teachers can register a school and sign students up at www.calltocode.ie before 12:00pm on 23rd November. Students then access the resources, from beginner to advanced level, provided on the Call to Code website to practice and develop their coding skills. These resources can also be used by teachers looking to introduce their students to code.

We’re looking forward to seeing more teenagers in Ireland embrace the power of coding and equip themselves with the knowledge and skills to pursue exciting and diverse careers.
- Posted by Erin Mindell Cannon, Education Program Manager

WE ARE… transforming the face of technology

A single image cannot capture women in computing. Rather, it's a mosaic of different images coming together that can capture the power of our community. This year at the Grace Hopper Celebration for Women in Computing, we created a collaborative photo installation in celebration of women in tech everywhere.

Technology has the potential to change lives, and together we can create more ways for everyone to participate.

If you’re at #GHC15, add your portrait to the installation on Level 3 at the Skybridge. For those who aren’t here in Houston, check out #facesintech and be sure to join in.