Youths learn English through festive competition

Holy Cross College English Language Club (HCCELC) successfully organised its first ever online based competition, 3rd Inter College English Language Festival 2021 on March 05 and 06. The club arranges yearly festivals to bring individuals from around the country together, creates opportunities to let linguistic enthusiasts learn vocabulary in a fun way, conducts discussions to include more members and keep doing other activities besides only being a fest-oriented club.
The event was arranged with an aim to create an eccentric and innovative platform where talented youths will come together to explore their creativity while harnessing their analytical abilities. To offer a dynamic platform not only for writers or linguists, but also for other artists of various sorts, this club brought forth some intriguing event. Picture illustrations, digital/traditional art to add a slot for painters, role-playing to bring out inner talent in acting, treasure hunting to rile up deductive skills, followed by the conventional events such as writing and playing with words, classical turn the coat event to debate own opinions, traditional grammar quiz, etc. are the most significant ones.
The segments had unique names; 'Where art meets literature ft. Covid-19,' 'What if I was there,' 'Labyrinth of literature,' 'Act it out,' 'Multimedia presentation,' 'Ekphrasis,' 'Turn the coat' and 'Grammar mania.' The chief guest Dr Fakrul Alam, professor of English at Dhaka University and special guest Rokhsana Akhter Rupee, TESOL consultant and researcher at Toastmasters International, graced the opening ceremony held at Holy Cross College auditorium on March 05.
The competition took place on discord server with the presence of around 1,000 registered students from 78 institutions including 22 English medium schools. The closing ceremony on March 06 had Dr Deena Forkan, senior professor and former chairperson of Department of English at North South University, as the chief guest, Holy Cross College alumnae and special guest, Dr Bijoy Lal Basu, who distributed prizes among the winners.
Shahad Islam Mugdho, member of the champion team of multimedia presentation segment, mentioned, "Online events are somewhat different due to the issues we usually face in doing them. But unlike most other events, the whole thing went really smooth with the timely and well-constructed procedures along with a learned group of judges to assess the participants."
Afra Ibnat, president of HCCELC, said, "Reminiscing the sleepless nights, I can proudly say that we got the fruit of our efforts. We wanted to welcome creative minds, hence launched a festival which intertwined literature with various forms of art. I believe the diversified talent of the participants is the pinion of opulence."

The writer is currently studying

economics at Bangladesh University of Professionals.

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