★GUIDELINES★

Fifteen finalists will be invited to make a speech on Sunday, March 26th, 2023.

1. You must not be a native speaker of the Japanese language.

2. You must currently be enrolled in high school or college/university in San Diego County. Enrollment in a Japanese program is not mandatory as long as the applicant is currently a registered student at high school or college/university in San Diego.

3. You must not have had more than six months of schooling in Japan after age reaching the Japanese compulsory education starting age.

4. You must not have been raised in a Japanese-speaking household. (Must not live in a home with a native speaker of Japanese (including spouse, parent/grandparent/relation, etc.)

5. You must be either a U.S. citizen, permanent resident of the U.S. and a resident of San Diego County. Any Individuals currently attending school, college or university on a F-1 student visa are unfortunately ineligible.

6. You might receive a phone call by a committee member in case any parts of the written application are unclear.

7. You must answer all the questions in the application form sincerely to the best of your knowledge.

8. You need a recommender: either your Japanese teacher at your school. If your school does not offer Japanese, a teacher at your school who knows you well. Letter of recommendation is not necessary.

★THE SPEECH★

1 Should be between 3-4 minutes in length, and must not be shorter than three minutes, and must not be longer than five minutes.

2 Choice of topic is open.

3 Must be original and written by the contestant himself/herself.

★JUDGING CRITERIA★

Judges will base their decisions on content and presentation of speech. There will be short interviews in Japanese with the judges after each speech presentation. The contestants with highest total points awarded by the judges will be the winners.

★Content selection of theme, originality, creativity, and ability to touch the audience’s heart)
★Structure how well the speech is organized and how logically and smoothly the argument or the content flows

★Japanese language:

Appropriate use of sentence structure and vocabulary, and accuracy of pronunciation and accent—or comprehensibility

★Over-all impression: Attitude, posture, voice audibility, connection with the audience, including eye contact; and fluency)

★Interview responses:

Clear and appropriate answers.