Juvenes Translatores Contest 2010

23rd of October is noted by a translation contest organized by the European Commission.

Juvenes Translatores is a contest among secondary schools with Europe. There are 27 participating countries with over 700 schools competing, including schools in Portugal, United Kingdom, Finland, Cyprus, Hungary, Poland and other countries.

Today in the morning, all participants have received an email with a one-page text that has to be fluently translated from one of EU official languages into another language of their choice. In majority of cases scholars choose their native language which is the strongest. The contest takes place everywhere at the same time – 10-12 noon Brussels time. After the contest, professional translators from the European Commission’s Directorate-General for Translation will evaluate all the submitted translations and select the winner within each participating country. 27 pupils with the best translations will be invited to an awards ceremony held Brussels in spring 2011, and will meet the Commissioner for Multilingualism. Organizers of the contest will pay travel and accommodation expenses for the winner and their accompanying supporter.

Juvenes Translatores mainly promotes young people’s will to learn foreign languages. “In the long run, learning languages brings people closer and allows a better understanding of other cultures. It will allow today's young people - tomorrow's adults - to move more easily from one European country to another, for studies and work.” – European Commission.

The contest aims to support and stimulate school exchange programs. According to the official website straight after the second contest took its place, the language teacher from one of participating schools in Sweden has initiated to launch a school exchange with France and Spain.

Juvenes Translatores also brings the awareness about translation studies and so rapidly growing need for translators. As learning languages opens various opportunities of moving within the EU countries and abroad, quality translations become an essential issue in intercultural communication especially when it comes to the context of business.

Also recently, another big language contest, Language Olympics 2010, took place in Europe.