Jakarta Holds Southeast Asian English Olympics
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This is the VOA Special English Education Report.
The Southeast Asian English Olympics begin Monday in Jakarta. High school and [A]university students[/A] will compete to [A]demonstrate[/A] their English skills at the Anggrek campus of Binus University.
The Bina Nusantara English Club at the university started the English Olympics in two [A]thousand[/A] five. The yearly competition was formerly known as the Nationwide English Olympics.
This year the club [A]invited[/A] other Southeast Asian schools to send "ambassadors" to join students from Indonesia. The [A]organizers[/A] hope to have four hundred or more students take part.
There are six areas of competition. One is based on Scrabble, the board game where[A] players[/A] try to form words from letters with different [A]point values[/A]. Other areas include speech, storytelling and newscasting. Students will be judged on their ability to present the news.
Yohanes Napis is the twenty-year-old chief [A]executive[/A] officer of next week's Olympics. He says the biggest event is the debate competition, which will include international judges. He says the competition will use the British parliamentary [A]system[/A] but debaters can use either British or American English.
Organizers of the Southeast Asian English Olympics are getting [A]support[/A] from the American Embassy in Jakarta and VOA. The finals will take place Saturday, February nineteenth, in a new high-tech American cultural center called @america. It opened in December in the Pacific Place Mall in Jakarta.
There are also plans for one hundred Indonesian high school students to come to the @america center next Friday. They will choose their [A]favorite[/A] entry in the sixth area of competition, short movie making. But adult judges will choose the winners of the gold, silver and bronze medals.
Yohanes Napis says the Southeast Asian English Olympics might [A]expand[/A] next year into the Asian English Olympics.
YOHANES NAPIS: "Two months ago we already have [A]participants[/A] from Bangladesh, but unfortunately we cannot accept them because this is actually the Southeast Asian English Olympics. We already have [A]participants[/A] as well from China, who already asked if they are [A]eligible[/A] to join this Olympics. But unfortunately we have to [A]refuse[/A] them, and also from Bangladesh as well. So I think we have a good [A]chance[/A] to actually expand the scale into Asian for next year."
