San Gabriel Art Student Wins Prestigious Award

Close up of Yanuo (Sophia) Li’s winning piece (Photo – Cheryl Cabot)

Yanuo (Sophia) Li, 12, an art student at West California Academy of Art & Design (WCAAD) in San Gabriel, won first place for the State of California in the Doodle4Google contest. There is only one winner from each state, in ages K-12. Her doodle was selected from thousands of entries.

By Cheryl Cabot

Sponsored by Google, the Doodle4Google contest is in its 16^th year. The theme for this year was “My Wish for the Next 25 Years.” Each entry incorporated the letters G-o-o-g-l-e and included a written paragraph about their wish. Sophia Li won first place for the State of California.

Justin Valle, Google ambassador, presented the award to Sophia and explained that her winning design will now be entered into the national competition to be one of five finalists or the winner.

Yanuo (Sophia) Li’s artwork needs your vote (Photo – Cheryl Cabot)

Vote for Sophia

You can vote for Sophia Li here at Grade 6-7, California: Doodle4Google Vote.

Each winner will receive a $5,000 scholarship. The grand prize winner will receive $55,000 in scholarship money as well as a $50,000 technology package. The winning art piece will be featured on the Google search engine for a day.”

In addition to receiving the award from Valle, Sophie received a commendation from San Gabriel Mayor John Wu and Councilmember Tony Ding.

According to Lei Wang, Principal of West California Academy of Art & Design, their students have been taking an active part in the annual Doodle4Google art contest every year since 2017. In addition to Sophia’s win this year, Eric Chang, 7 years old, won in 2017 and Angie Li, 10 years old, won in 2020.

(L-R) San Gabriel Mayor John Wu, Sophia Li, Noriko Yanagisawa, Sophia’s art teacher, Lei Wang, Principal of WCAAD, and Councilmember Tony Ding (Photo – Cheryl Cabot)