Update: The 2024-25 translation competition has closed, and results can be found here.

The European Union Center at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign invites high school students from Illinois to take part in a translation competition featuring seven languages: German, Greek, Hebrew, Italian, Polish, Swedish, and Ukrainian. Students will translate an intermediate- to advanced-level text from one of the seven languages into English. The texts, which range from literature to news articles, have been chosen by university faculty and graduate students who are native speakers of the languages. The 2024-25 Illinois High School Translation Competition aims to promote language study and to provide high school students with an opportunity to get hands-on experience in translation. 

How to participate:

First, fill out a registration form. You will then receive an automated email with links to the texts. The competition task this year is twofold. You will be asked to translate the text into English and write a short paragraph in English in which you comment on an interesting challenge you encountered while translating. Your translation and explanatory paragraph should be submitted as a single Microsoft Word document or PDF via this link or by email to eucenter@illinois.edu. 

Please note that registration is not a guarantee of inclusion in the competition and that only the first 15 submissions for each language will be considered, so do not wait until the deadline to submit your translation. If the cap is reached, this will be indicated on the registration and submission forms. If you have any questions about this or would like to know how many submissions have been received so far for any of the target languages, please write to eucenter@illinois.edu. 

Additional information:

Eligibility:

All students who are enrolled in high school in Illinois during the 2024-25 academic year are eligible to participate. Home-schooled students who reside in Illinois are also eligible to participate.

Rules:

Students may enter the competition independently, or teachers may coordinate the participation of multiple students. The translation of the text must be the individual student’s independent work, without help from others. The use of print and online dictionaries is permitted, but students should not use machine translation services such as Google Translate or ChatGPT.

Judging:

The competition will be judged by university faculty and instructors who have native knowledge of the target languages and who have experience with translation. One winning entry will be chosen for each of the seven target languages, with 1-2 honorable mentions at the judges' discretion. All students will be notified of the competition results in late November 2024.

Awards:

The winners and honorable mention recipients will be given a prize and a certificate from the European Union Center at the University of Illinois, and they will be recognized at an award ceremony in Chicago on December 6, 2024.

For further information:

Please don’t hesitate to write to eucenter@illinois.edu with any questions or concerns.