High school students from all over the region participated in the Kontext language competition

At the beginning of January, a competition called Kontext tested high school students from all over the region to see how well they understood English professional texts. The unifying theme of this year's competition was health and technology.

35 schools, almost four thousand students and 85 finalists in a total of five categories. The sixth finals of the regional on-line competition Kontext, focused on the comprehension of English professional text, took place on 9 and 10 January at the University of West Bohemia in Pilsen. Every year, high school students from all over the Pilsen Region take part in the competition.

Expert texts on the topic of technology and health and the opportunity to win interesting prizes - this is not the only thing that attracted high school students who took part in the on-line tests in November last year. There were four rounds and a total of 3,798 students from 35 schools took part. The contestants were divided into five categories according to year and school type. The winners of the school rounds then advanced to the attendance finals, which were held at the University of West Bohemia.

"Thanks to their participation in the competition, the students gained the opportunity to develop their language skills, which they will definitely apply in their future studies and professional career. At the finals, they could experience the atmosphere of the exam period at UWB, where they themselves may study in the future," said Lucie Rohlíková from the Division of Lifelong and Distance Learning. The Kontext competition is thus one of the many activities of the University of West Bohemia in Pilsen that targets potential applicants for study.

The finalists took the final on-line test in the computer classroom. The five most successful contestants from each category advanced to the final oral round in front of a committee, with whom they were interviewed about the professional text that decided the final ranking. The selection of the texts for the whole competition and their processing was provided by the Institute of Applied Language Studies.

"The text were interesting and I didn't find them overly challenging, which was great. Only the interview with the committee was quite difficult, but I would like to try it again next year," said Ela from the second year of the Integrated Trade Secondary School of Business, one of the finalists of the competition.

The winners then received vouchers for the purchase of electronics from the Pilsen Region and vouchers for language courses at the International Summer Language School of the University of West Bohemia in Pilsen.

The competition is regularly organized by the Pilsen Region in cooperation with the University of West Bohemia in Pilsen and is intended for students of grammar schools, secondary vocational schools and apprenticeship schools.

Results of the competition:

Category 1A: grammar school students of 1st - 2nd year (fifth and sixth of multi-year grammar school)

1st place: Jan Pěchouček - Gymnázium, Stříbro

2nd place: Carmen Kreuzer - Masarykovo gymnázium Plzeň

3rd place: Matěj Kubias - Sportovní gymnázium

Category 1B: grammar school students of 3rd - 4th year (seventh and eighth year of multi-year grammar school)

1st place: Kateřina Bobková - Gymnázium Luďka Pika

2nd place: Jiří Sitera - Církevní gymnázium Plzeň

3rd place: Ondřej Krampol - Gymnázium J. Vrchlického, Klatovy

Category 2A: students of secondary vocational schools and apprenticeship schools with matriculation 1st – 2nd year

1st place: Ema Kolářová - SOŠ, Stříbro, Benešova 508

2nd place: Tomáš Hepner - VŠ, OA and SZŠ Domažlice