A second-year student from Nanjing University transcended all competitors yesterday at the Ninth "21st Century and SFLEP Cup" National English Speaking Competition by sweeping the three top honors.

Hong Ye, a 19-year-old English major, won the "21st Century and SFLEP Cup," "Most Promising Speaker" and "SFLEP Creativity Award."

She will travel to London to compete in the International Public Speaking competition in May.

"I didn't expect to win because all the other competitors were very competitive and spoke English well," said Hong.

"Winning the competition will certainly add something to my resume."

Wei Xiangjun from Fudan University and Zhong Yurou from Tsinghua University took second and third places, respectively. Both won two-week study tours to Britain.

The competition saw 32 university students from the Chinese mainland and one from Macao match their speaking skills against one another.

Their central topic was on the value of acquiring a college education in today's world, and the challenges and opportunities for students.

Each spoke in front of a 3,000-strong audience of university students at Wuhan International Convention and Exhibition Center in the capital of Hubei Province, Central China.

The event was sponsored by China Daily and the Shanghai Foreign Language Education Press. Contestants were required to present a 5-minute prepared speech and a 3-minute extemporaneous talk.

They were also asked to take part in a 3-minute question and answer session.

In her prepared speech, Hong described three doors that provide students with different opportunities and challenges.

"The first door is the opportunity to study different subjects that interest us. The second door is to the outside world, and the third is the door to life-long learning," Hong said.

Huang Qing, managing editor of China Daily said: "The young speakers are all winners and there were no losers in this competition."

(China Daily April 9, 2004)