Google Code-in gives teens the chance to code something real

google code inThe Google Code-in is a contest to introduce students aged 13-17 to the many kinds of contributions that make open source software development possible. The contest runs from December 1, 2014 to January 19, 2015.

For many students the Google Code-in contest will be their first introduction to open source development. Google Code-in works with open source organizations, each of whom has experience mentoring university students in the Google Summer of Code program, to provide “bite sized” tasks for participating students to complete during the seven week contest.

These tasks include:

  1. Code: Tasks related to writing or refactoring code
  2. Documentation/Training: Tasks related to creating/editing documents and helping others learn more
  3. Outreach/Research Tasks related to community management, outreach/marketing or studying problems and recommending solutions
  4. Quality Assurance: Tasks related to testing and ensuring code is of high quality
  5. User Interface: Tasks related to user experience research or user interface design and interaction

Students earn one point for each task completed. Students will receive a certificate for completing one task and can earn a t-shirt when they complete three tasks. At the end of the contest each of the open source organizations will name two grand prize winners for their organization based upon the students’ body of work. The grand prize winners will receive a trip to Google’s Mountain View Headquarters for themselves and a parent or legal guardian for an award ceremony, an opportunity to meet with Google engineers, explore the Google campus and have a fun day in the San Francisco sun.

This is a wonderful opportunity for students to do something useful and create something that isn’t a game. The range of activities and bite-sized chunks means this should be interesting and accessible to students with a wide range of experience and skills.

For the details see the website or tune in to the Google Open Source Blog or subscribe to the contest announcement list for updates.

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