Gold Star is a Google Sheets add-on for teachers, free to start. Pick a class, tick who gets the award, and Gold Star makes beautiful certificates, emails them to pupils or parents, and keeps a record. It works with Google Forms and quizzes, and your Canva or Autocrat designs too.
Coming from Autocrat? Keep your templates. Gold Star uses the same <<tag>> markers, finds your Autocrat jobs, and marks every row Autocrat already merged as done, so nothing is made twice.
What it does
Give an award in a minute. Import your class from Google Classroom (or paste a list) once, then tick who gets it and send.
Six professional designs, a bright Primary collection for younger children, and the premium Signature collection, in your school’s colours, with your logo and signatures, or upload your own design from Canva.
Ink saver for printing in school: white backgrounds and fine lines instead of solid colour.
Email to pupils, parents or both, or print a class set in one PDF for assembly.
Fair by design. See who hasn’t had an award yet, and when everyone last had one.
Quizzes sorted properly: Gold, Silver and Bronze or Pass, Merit and Distinction, each with its own design.
Automatic certificates from Google Forms, or hourly or daily from any spreadsheet.
Photos and pictures from your sheet, a different design per row, Bcc, and one print-ready PDF for the whole class.
Dates in any format and ten languages, names tidied automatically, and long names always fit.
Switching from Autocrat, Form Publisher or Certify’em? Your templates work unchanged.
Gold Star can’t see your Drive
It only opens the sheet you’re in and the files it makes for you. Gold Star runs entirely inside Google Workspace. It never copies your sheet or documents to our servers, and it can only open files you choose with Google’s file picker and files it creates for you. Read the privacy policy. School IT team? See Gold Star for IT teams.