Big Bear Competition
Big Bear Competition is a four-stage contest:
- Say Your Mind
- Bridge to Success
- Semi-finals
- Finals
Say Your Mind
This first stage is open to every student whether registered in English department or not. Each contestant has to write a text in English (true history or fiction, story, poem) following the criteria below:
- Printed document
- Type of fonts : Times New Romans
- Size of fonts : 14
- Space-ligne : 1,5
- Number of words : Minimum: 300 ; Maximum: 500
The texts shall be put in a middle-size format envelope and dropped at one of organizers’. After dropping, each candidate will have to sign on a submission sheet. Their works will be forwarded to Titigweti Secretary’s office. A panel composed of lecturers and other qualified people will be in charge of proofreading and selecting the first hundred best works.
NB: To ensure the anonymity during the marking, no signs or names of a candidate should be found on the paper that bears their work.
Bridge to Success
The second step takes into account the hundred pre-selected contestants. Bridge to Success is divided into two stages: the first called ‘‘Words Party ’’ is an oral test during which the candidates will have to spell some words. Each candidate will have to spell five words and be graded. The second stage is called ‘’Talent Show’’. Here, each candidate will give a performance of their choice in English. They will be free to give either a poem, or sing some song, or say some joke, or tell some story. Each candidate will be graded too. At the end of BRIDGE TO SUCCESS, the sum of ‘’Words Party’’ and ‘’Talent Show’’ grades will be divided by two. The first thirty contestants will go for the semi-final.
Semi-finals
At this very stage, candidates will make five groups of six. Each group will go through two challenges: listening and reading. For the listening, candidates will listen to an audio excerpt and fill the gaps on the text they are given. For the reading, each candidate will read a text before a panel. The criteria include: dressing, timing, intonation, punctuation, and phonetics. The grades of the two stages will be combined and divided by two. At the end of the semifinal, only the six (06) first candidates who got higher marks will go in for the final.
Finals
This is the very last stage of the Big Bear Competition. The six finalists will go through two proofs: a questionnaire and an exposé.
- Each finalist will choose a number which corresponds to a list of three questions about general knowledge. The questions will be worth 30 marks.
- The exposé will be about a news topic. Candidates will be given some time to think about their arguments and tidy up their ideas. The performance will be worth 50 marks and the criteria are the following: theme analysis (20 points); argument (20 points) ; eloquence (10 points). After the performance of each candidate, the jury will ask two questions (10 points per question) about their exposé.