Senior wins National Japanese Speech Contest

(c) Aurora Foundation 2006 Photo by Tetsuya Fukui

Senior Lauren B. has won the third annual Aurora Foundation National Japanese Language High School Speech Contest and will go on to represent the United States at the Japanese Speech Contest (JSA) in Tokyo, Japan this summer.

“This contest is at a national level, and Lauren had to win locally before she could participate at this level. She has been dedicated to her understanding of Japanese since she began studying Japanese at age twelve. We wish her the greatest success this summer when she competes in Tokyo, ” states Cohen. “Lauren plans to continue her Japanese languages studies at Carleton College this fall.”

As the national winner, Lauren will compete in Tokyo with all expenses paid for by JSA. Lauren also received a trophy and a scholarship of $500 from the Aurora Foundation.

Lauren presented her speech on “The Magic of Spaciousness” for the five-minute time limit and then was interviewed by the judges on her chosen topic.

Fifteen students participated in the finals by making presentations in Japanese and were chosen from a pool consisting of the top three winners of various regional Japanese language speech contests held throughout the USA. The contest was hosted by The Aurora Japanese Language Scholarship Foundation, in association with NCJLT (National Council of Japanese Language Teachers) in Los Angeles this month. For more information: Aurora Foundation The contest is open to non-native speakers of Japanese who do not have a Japanese parent and have not had more than six months of schooling in Japan after age six and are currently in high-school.