To celebrate the 70th Anniversary of the United Nations, the United Nations Academic Impact, in association with ELS Educational Services, Inc., is launching a global essay contest focusing on multilingualism.

The Many Languages, One World Essay Competition is to support multilingualism and the continued study of the United Nations’ six official languages: Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Russian and Spanish. As such, students are being asked to write their essays in their non-native language.

The competition will culminate in an international conference of selected essay winners.

Ten winners will be selected from each language group, for a total of 60.

ELS Educational Services, Inc. will award each winner with a five day all expenses paid trip to New York, from June 25-29, 2014.
Students will attend a conference at Adelphi University and take part in a youth forum at United Nations Headquarters.

Students 18 years of age and older who are enrolled in a full-time program of study in a college or university anywhere in the world are eligible to compete.

A requirement for all participants is that their essay be in an official United Nations language which is not their mother tongue or principal medium of educational instruction.
Qualified contestants will be invited to go to New York City for a series of events in June 25 -29, 2014.

The essay, not to exceed 2000 words, should explore how multilingual ability advances global citizenship and understanding.
The essay should reflect the entrant’s academic, cultural and national context, and should outline a program of action to support the following principles of the United Nations Academic Impact:

• Human rights, among them freedom of inquiry, opinion, and speech
• Educational opportunity for all people regardless of gender, race, religion or ethnicity
• Encouraging global citizenship through education
• Advancing peace and conflict resolution through education
• Addressing issues of poverty through education
• Promoting inter-cultural dialogue and understanding, and the “unlearning” of intolerance, through education

The deadline for essay submissions is 21 February 2014.

For additional information, We invite you then to visit the UNAI website http://manylanguagesoneworld.els.edu
or to write to: academicimpact@un.org; or lsoto@els.edu

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