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Notting Hill and Ealing High School students win trip to China

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Six Ealing school girls have won an all-expenses-paid trip to Beijing.

NHEHS winners

The students from Notting Hill and Ealing High School won the national final of the British Council and HSBC’s Mandarin Chinese Speaking Competition.

 More than 70 schools from across the UK entered the competition and after impressing the judges with their language skills in a regional heat in London in December, the NHEHS students competed in the grand final on 9 February 2016 held at the British Museum.

 Cassia Fillingham (15), Gabby MacConnol (14) Flossie Morris (13), Eshana Sarkar (14) Bella Szczech (15) and Dhruti Vijay (14) have been learning Mandarin since Year 7 and they were accompanied on the day by one of their Mandarin teachers Mrs Paula Luo.

Headteacher, Lucinda Hunt, said  “I am absolutely delighted by the team’s success in this very prestigious competition.  The girls have been working hard to prepare but, more importantly, have thoroughly enjoyed the whole experience and are extremely excited about winning.  I am so proud of them, and of the Mandarin department.  At NHEHS we believe that speaking a foreign language is enormously important for social and economic reasons, but that true communication comes from an understanding of the culture, history and context that inform a language.  With our new world Languages Pathway we offer Mandarin from Year 1 and German, Spanish and French from Year 7, giving girls opportunities like this one, to become excellent linguists and confident global citizens.”

The girls all agree that taking part in the competition has been a great experience.  Flossie Morris said : ''Although it was hard work and we rehearsed practically every morning before school we really enjoyed it and I think we got the most out of it that we possibly could.” 

Dhruti Vijay added “Our confidence in speaking Mandarin and especially our pronunciation has improved a lot throughout the competition.”  Gabby MacConnol agreed adding “It was such a lot of fun and we’ve won the most amazing prize.  We are so looking forward to going to Beijing.”

The nationwide competition aims to encourage greater interest in Chinese language and culture – which is vital to the UK’s future prosperity. Not only is Mandarin Chinese already spoken by more than a billion people worldwide, but China is recognised as the world’s second largest economy and could potentially wrest the top spot from the US by 2050.

However, research carried out by YouGov on behalf of the British Council in 2013 showed that only 1% of UK adults can speak Mandarin Chinese with the numbers of pupils studying Mandarin at GCSE and A-level low in comparison to more traditional languages such as French, German and Spanish. In 2015, just 3,710 took a GCSE in Mandarin Chinese compared to 157,699 who took one in French and 90,782 who took one in Spanish.

The competition is aimed at students who are non-native speakers, who have started learning Mandarin Chinese recently. Over the past 13 years, it has helped to inspire hundreds of young people to further their Mandarin studies - some going on to graduate in Mandarin Chinese.

 

 

 

17th February 2016

 

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