Google over the weekend announced Nil Carreras Del Peso, of French School, and Nana Abena Asabea Ametepe, of Golden Age school, as winners of this year’s Doodle 4 Google competition.

The winning Doodles - created around the theme of ‘My Ghana’ - will be displayed on the Google Ghana homepage at www.google.com.gh for 24 hours on Wednesday 15th June and Thursday 16th June 2011 respectively, where they will be viewed by millions of people.

Nil Carreras Del Peso, winner of the 9-11 age group competition, will receive a Kindle, while Nana Abena, who took the prize for the 12-14 age group, will receive a laptop. In addition, the schools of both winners will get a USD 2,000 technology grant.

This year’s competition received a record number of entries: a 133% increase on last year. The winners beat off strong competition in their respective age categories, and as well as designing Doodles around the local theme, all entrants also provided a supporting statement explaining their design choice.

The competition was judged by a panel of judges including Google Ghana Country Lead Estelle Akofio-Sowah and a team of Googlers, who selected the finalists based on artistic merit, creativity and the representation of this year’s theme.

Commenting on the competition, Estelle Akofio Sowah said “Judging this year’s Doodle4Google competition was an absolute pleasure. The standard of entries was outstanding -- there's clearly a huge amount of pride and excitement among young people in Ghana. The fact that we received more than double the number of entries from last year’s competition, demonstrates that children, when encouraged, are willing and able to rise to a challenge. The future of Ghana in the hands of these young people, is clearly bright.”