EDUCATION | Speech contest seeks to foster young local talent

Contestants had an in-depth discussion about important issues such as gender equality and animal rights in the 13th Macau-wide English Speech Contest & 20th “21st Century Cup” National English Speaking Competition Macau Regional Contest. The final round and award ceremony took place last Sunday at the Macau Polytechnic Institute, which was the organizer of the event.
Two of the winners from each of the upper primary, junior and senior high school categories, and up to three winners of the college category will have the chance to participate in the nationwide “21st Century Cup” competition. The organizer hopes that the contest will encourage young people to not only acquire more knowledge, but to develop a more global vision at the same time.
The Times spoke to one of the judges, Bev Harrison, head of Off-Side Programs from Bell Educational Services. She was very impressed by the performance of the contestants. “I think that there are some extremely accomplished young children in Macau. I think one of the things that impressed me the most is their global perspective on things, the range of reading they had, their understanding of what’s happening in the world [and] also their confidence; that they were able to put their ideas across so confidently,” she said.
In her opinion, Ms Harrison believes that it is a combination of English proficiency, the manner in which contenders put their argument forward, and their ideas and creativity that is important. She also suggested that contestants could further improve their performance by delivering their speeches in a more natural way instead of presenting them in a rehearsed manner.
“I think they are so intent on getting their messages across and doing their best that they want [the speech] to be very polished. Sometimes, it’s nice if it is more of a dialogue with the audience,” she said.
Meanwhile, the champion of the competition’s open category, Qian Qiao, told the Times that this is the fourth time he has participated and felt that his hard work finally paid off.
The University of Macau postgraduate student said that from his observation, many of his colleagues in the university have reached a high level of English proficiency due to the fact that they were exposed to an English speaking environment during their school years. JPL