In order to celebrate the arrival of May, develop students' patriotism and cultural confidence, create a campus atmosphere of "rooted in Chinese culture and integrating with the international community," and improve our students' communication skills, the first "Chinese Storytelling" English speech competition was successfully held on May 24th, 2023 in the Annex Building G auditorium. The event was organized by the College Students Committee and hosted by the School of Business, with the cooperation from the School of Liberal Arts. The judging panel included Vice President Kay Li, Zhang, Dean Lynn Lin, Zhang, Dean Karen Keran, Zhang and Ms. Julie Tung.

The theme of the competition was "Chinese stories" and after several rounds of selection, nine finalists were selected to participate in this competition.

Each of the participants had prepared extensively, with clear and outstanding themes, precise and fluent language expression, rich emotions and gripping stories. Some gave accounts of Chinese people's resilience and tenacity in the face of the pandemic's impact, while others commemorated the spirit of soldiers of the People's Liberation Army who selflessly sacrificed themselves for the nation. Through their captivating speeches, they allowed the audience to deeply feel the changes of the times and the social progress, and inspired everyone with a sense of pride in Chinese culture. The competition aroused continuous applause from the audience on site, and praise from viewers online.

After the competition, Vice President Kay Li, Zhang provided a wonderful commentary and praised the outstanding performances of all participants, emphasizing the importance of speech competitions in enhancing students' oral proficiency, organizational abilities, and adaptability. VP Zhang also encouraged the students to seize every opportunity to improve themselves while not neglecting the development of comprehensive abilities.

This speech competition provided our students with an opportunity to exercise and display their excellent language skills and their enthusiastic spirit, as well as their deep love for their country. The judges were delighted by the remarkable performances of all participants, and the live audience expressed their deep appreciation. Through the promotion of Chinese stories, we hope to motivate Chinese students to spontaneously spread Chinese culture to foreign people, convey China's positive energy, showcase China's spirit, and promote cultural exchanges between China and foreign countries.

After intense competition, the first, second and third place winners in the Chinese and English groups were announced:

First Prize: Liangying, Li and Wenjie, Yang

Second Prize: Limei, Xie, Yushi, Zhang and Jialin, Yu

Third Prize: Yusong, Tao, Jiaxi, Ke, Yuhang, Huang and Jingjing, Zhu

Chinese stories will always be disseminated, and the voice of China will always reverberate. We will continue to move forward with firm determination. We sincerely wish all students to actively strive for excellence in their future studies and to achieve even greater accomplishments!

Written by: Qianzhu, Tao

Photos by: Hanyue, Xue & Rong, Gao

Translated by: Eddy Leong