Educating for American Democracy
K-12 Student Design Challenge Contest Educating for American Democracy K-12 Student Design Challenge Contest

Explore the winning student artwork here!

The design challenges and EAD framework are flexible and offer room for inquiry, a diversity of viewpoints, debate, tension, complexity, nuance, and disagreement. The artwork below is the students’ own interpretation of the design challenges, but they are not representative of the only way to interpret the design challenges. The artwork and thoughts are the student’s own and do not represent the views of EAD, EAD leadership, or EAD affiliates.

Student entries will be blindly judged by top leaders in the field of history and civic research and education. The artwork submissions will be divided and reviewed across two grade bands: Grades K-5 and Grades 6-12.

Judges will be looking for original artwork that exemplifies the core philosophy of incorporating the Design Challenges within the Educating for American Democracy Project:

• Originality and Creativity
  Work that presents a unique concept, design, or execution developed exclusively by a student.
• Artistic Quality (or Clarity)
  Work that allows a viewer to clearly understand the intent of the artistic design.
• Expression of the Educating for American Democracy Design Challenge Concepts
  Work that connects and captures the tensions represented in the Design Challenges.

What is an original artwork?

An original artwork is one that is unique and different from what other individuals have created. It represents your individual thinking and interpretation of the Design Challenge and does not copy someone else’s original work. If your artwork incorporates another artist’s materials, such as a collage, you must transform the pre-existing work in a way that adds value and gives a new meaning to the piece. For example, changing the medium (e.g., photography to paint) or cropping or resizing an image does NOT make the work transformative.

Winning artworks may be used in a variety of ways by iCivics, including in Educating for American Democracy published resources and on the iCivics and Educating for American Democracy website. By submitting your artwork to the Educating for American Democracy K-12 Student Design Challenge Contest, you hereby irrevocably grant iCivics perpetual, irrevocable, worldwide, royalty-free, transferable, non-exclusive, sublicensable permission to use, copy, modify, publish, distribute, exhibit, add to and create derivative works from the artwork you submit for any purpose.

Our amazing judges, who are top leaders in their field of history and civics, will include:

• Valencia Abbott, History Social Studies Educator, Rockingham Early College High School – North Carolina
• Tyron Bey, Civics and Social Studies Educator, Prince George’s County Public Schools – Maryland
• Amanda Cobb-Greetham, Professor, Native American Studies Department, University of Oklahoma
• Shawn P. Healy, Senior Director of State Policy and Advocacy, iCivics
• Michelle M. Herczog, Coordinator III, History-Social Science, Los Angeles County Office of Education – California
• Jane Kamensky, Jonathan Trumbull Professor of American History, Harvard University and Pforzheimer Foundation Director, Schlesinger Library on the History of Women in America, Harvard Radcliffe Institute
• Peter Levine, Lincoln Filene Professor of Citizenship and Public Affairs, Jonathan M. Tisch College at Tufts University
• Sonia Mathew, Program Officer, Democracy Program, Robert R. McCormick Foundation
• Adam Seagrave, Associate Professor and Associate Director, School of Civic and Economic Thought and Leadership at Arizona State University
• Tammy Waller, Director of K-12 Social Studies and World Languages, Arizona Department of Education

Students who submit artworks to the Educating for American Democracy K-12 Student Design Challenge Contest will retain any intellectual property rights they have in their artworks, including copyright. This means, for example, you can submit the same artwork you submit to us to other scholarship programs or contests, keep the work in your portfolio, and license it to others for non-exclusive publication.

To run the Educating for American Democracy K-12 Student Design Challenge Contest, iCivics needs to be able to do certain things with the artworks submitted by students, such as copying, editing, and displaying them to process and judge submissions, award prizes, publicize winning entries and to otherwise further iCivics’ mission to ensure every student received a high quality civic education. To do these things, we need permission from you. By submitting your artwork to iCivics for the Educating for American Democracy K-12 Student Design Challenge Contest, you hereby irrevocably grant iCivics a perpetual, irrevocable, worldwide, royalty-free, transferable, non-exclusive right and license (with the right to sublicense) to use, copy, modify, publish, publicly perform, distribute, exhibit, add to and create derivative works from the artwork(s) you submit to iCivics for any purpose and in any media, including online.

By submitting your artwork to iCivics for the Educating for American Democracy K-12 Student Design Challenge Contest, you, or if you are a student under the age of 18, your parent or guardian, also hereby irrevocably and perpetually grant iCivics permission to take and use photographs, videos and recordings of you and to use your name, photograph or other image of you, likeness, voice, biographical information, and live and taped interviews or appearances given or made by you (your “Likeness”) for internal and external operational purposes of iCivics, including in connection with the Educating for American Democracy K-12 Student Design Challenge Contest and promotion of iCivics.

We will use commercially reasonable efforts to give you credit when we use your artwork submissions or Likeness in a public way, unless there is a practical reason why we cannot do so, such as formatting, or if the work is being used in a medium where no individual credits are given. Also, if we mistakenly do not give you credit in any given situation, if you let us know, we will use commercially reasonable efforts to correct that for similar uses in the future.

You hereby acknowledge and agree that you will not be compensated for your artwork submissions or for our use of your artwork submissions or Likeness, except for any cash award you may be granted if your artwork is selected as a winner of the Educating for American Democracy K-12 Student Design Challenge Contest.

We will not license your artwork or Likeness to third parties to publish under their name for their own commercial gain.

You hereby irrevocably and perpetually release iCivics from any and all claims, costs, liabilities and actions of any nature that may arise from our use of your artwork submissions or Likeness, including, without limitation any claims of copyright, libel, slander, violation of privacy or similar rights that you may have.

If your artwork is selected as a winner of the Educating for American Democracy K-12 Student Design Challenge Contest, iCivics may require you to send to iCivics the original physical artwork. If applicable, the work may be used in exhibitions throughout the country, so iCivics will not be able to give you access to the original work or return the original work to you. If we ask you to provide the original artwork for exhibition and you do not, we may choose, in our sole discretion, to revoke (that is, take back or cancel) your cash award.

ICIVICS, ANY SPONSORS OF THE EDUCATING FOR AMERICAN DEMOCRACY K- 12 STUDENT DESIGN CHALLENGE CONTEST, OR ANY OF THEIR RESPECTIVE EMPLOYEES, AGENTS, OR REPRESENTATIVES SHALL NOT HAVE ANY OBLIGATION OR LIABILITY WHATSOEVER FOR ANY LOSS OR NON-DELIVERY OF, OR DAMAGE TO, THE ORIGINAL ARTWORK THAT IS NOT CAUSED DIRECTLY BY SUCH PERSON’S OR ENTITY’S WILLFUL OR RECKLESS MISCONDUCT.

All work submitted to the Educating for American Democracy K-12 Student Design Challenge Contest must be original, meaning you must have created the work based on your own ideas. By submitting your artworks to iCivics, you represent and warrant that the artworks you are submitting are original works created by you and that such artworks were not copied from any other person, business, school, organization or entity and that, to your knowledge, the artworks you are submitting do not infringe upon, misappropriate or otherwise violate any intellectual property or proprietary rights of any third party. Any work that iCivics, in its sole discretion, determines does or may infringe, misappropriate or otherwise violate any third party’s intellectual property rights will be disqualified from the Educating for American Democracy K-12 Student Design Challenge Contest. You hereby acknowledge that you, and not iCivics, are solely responsible for obtaining any necessary consents or releases with respect to any people, places, property or materials depicted in the artworks you submit.

You hereby agree to indemnify and hold harmless iCivics and its officers, directors, employees and representatives from and against any and all third-party claims, demands, liabilities, costs and expenses, including reasonable outside counsel fees and legal disbursements arising out of or in connection with any claim, lawsuit or proceeding alleging that the artworks you submit to iCivics infringe, misappropriate or otherwise violate the intellectual property or any other rights of any third party.

iCivics may, in its sole discretion, revoke a student’s participation in the Educating for American Democracy K-12 Student Design Challenge Contest and take back or cancel any awards granted by iCivics if we determine that a submission does not comply with the Participation Terms or any other applicable iCivics policies (for example, any policies that apply to participants from certain regions) or that a participant has violated the Participation Terms or other iCivics applicable policies in any other way. Any participant whose award is taken back or cancelled may not identify himself or herself as the recipient of an award from iCivics.