NEW YORK (INPS) – The United Nations Academic Impact (UNAI) and the ELS Educational Services, Inc have launched the third edition of Many Languages, One World Essay Contest, to promote multilingualism as an integral part of global citizenship and peaceful coexistence.
The contest will qualify participants for a trip to New York to participate in the United Nations Global Youth Forum July 25-31, 2016. At the Global Youth Forum, the students will develop plans of action related to the UN’ 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.
UNAI is a program of the Outreach Division of the UN Department of Public Information. It is open to all institutions of higher education granting degrees or their equivalent, as well as bodies whose substantive responsibilities relate to the conduct of research.
Participants in the contest and the Global Youth Forum will also have the opportunity to interact with invited international scholars and tour New York City. The deadline for essay submissions is 11:59 p.m. EST Thursday 31 March 31, 2016. Full contest details, rules and entry guidelines, are available at ManyLanguagesOneWorld.ELS.edu.
For this year’s contest, 60 students will be selected from entries in each of the UN’s six official languages: Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Russian and Spanish. They are being asked to write essays in their second or third language.
In 2015, more than 3,500 people from 130 countries took part in the initial phase of the contest. 70 students from 42 countries, representing 60 universities were selected as winners from an essay pool of over 1,200.
Winners attended prestigious international universities such as the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (USA), Yonsei University (South Korea), and Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne (France). Their fields of study include art, human rights, medicine, engineering, law, business management, communications, international relations, and linguistics.
In 2014, over 4,000 people participated in some aspect of the competition. Close to 1,500 essays were submitted, with contestants from 128 different countries. The 60 winners represented 26 different countries and 6 continents.
Winners attended a diverse group of universities around the world, including such esteemed institutions as The University of Basel (Switzerland), Princeton University (USA), and Cornell University (USA). Their areas of study included engineering, political science, language, philosophy, economics, and computer science.
UNAI is committed to encouraging global citizenship through education. Its essential frame of reference is to: bring into association with the United Nations, and with each other, institutions of higher learning throughout the world; and provide a mechanism for such institutions to commit themselves to the fundamental precepts driving the UN mandate, in particular the realization of the universally determined Millennium Development Goals.
UNAI also fserves as a viable point of contact for ideas and proposals relevant to the UN mandate; and promote the direct engagement of institutions of higher education in programs, projects and initiatives relevant to this mandate. [International Press Syndicate – 14 January 2016]
Photo: 2015 batch of ‘Many Languages, One World Group’ of students at the UN