Apps for Good Awards 2021 - The Winners

WOW! Another amazing awards season at Apps for Good - students aged between 10-18 from across the world including students from the UK, US, India and Portugal have been competing in our 11th annual Apps for Good Awards.

As you might know, each year students design their own tech products based on real-world problems that they have identified. This year we added a new category in response to the surge of apps and products the students have created around climate change. It’s clearly a very important topic that our young people are recognising as an issue to solve. The Climate Creators award supported by BNY Mellon showcases technical solutions tackling the climate emergency.

There are 6 categories which are supported by technology and business partners Spotify, The LEGO Group, BNY Mellon, Deutsche Bank and Kingston Technology.

Climate Creators Winner: Valuable Trash - Creative ways to reuse your plastic waste.

Future Founders Winner: Dimming Dyslexia - Scan text and resources to translate them into an easy to read format.

Global Innovators Winner: Seventh - Creative ways to improve your mental health and wellbeing.

Digital Explorers Winner: Slides - Learn to read and unlock the next stage of a game every time you progress.

Community Heroes Winner: Classmates - Supporting struggling students to form secure study groups.

People’s Choice Winner: EcoClass - Teaching young people to be more sustainable and environmentally friendly.

Students' ideas address themes of loneliness, climate change, tools to help with studying, and mental health. Many students started lessons as a team during the school term supported by their teachers. While others got involved by using the home study resources that we created to support students during the pandemic.

“Throughout 2020 and 2021 we received enormous support from industry experts who volunteered their spare time to offer their advice and feedback to young people throughout their time undertaking the Apps for Good course. We are so proud and grateful to all the young people who continue to strive and contribute to a world which is ever changing, creating solutions to help us meet these challenges head on.” Heather Picov, CEO, Apps for Good.

We continue to be committed to giving young people the skills they need to thrive in the future using their free online resources for teachers. We couldn’t do any of this without the dedication and support of our partners and volunteers.

This year over 300 shortlisters from around the tech industry used our digital tool to review and provide valuable feedback to our awards entries. Helping us select the finalists but more importantly share real-world experience and knowledge with our students. Throughout the school year students can submit their work to Expert Feedback Tool and hundreds of volunteers are on hand from our partners to offer insight and support to the students.

A huge thank you to everyone that makes the awards possible; teachers, partners, experts, volunteers and the Apps for Good team. Most importantly the young people who bring their optimism and enthusiasm through every stage of the programme.