In the final round, 168 students gave multilingual speeches throughout Austria – also available for viewing on the ORF TV library
Vienna (OTS) – SAG’S MULTI, ORF’s multilingual, internationally unique speech competition, has come to an end after nine final days throughout Austria. As part of the final round, which took place from April 9th to 26th, 2024, 168 students from all federal states spoke on important topics such as identity, climate justice, democracy, racism, Europe, diversity, schools, bullying, mental health or human rights. , women’s and children’s rights. All events in the final round were broadcast live via ORF-TVthek and are still available on demand. The festive finale of the 15th anniversary of SAG’S MULTI will be the closing ceremony on June 17th in the Vienna City Hall.
30 languages in combination with German in the final round
SAG’S MULTI offers an exciting, multilingual speaking mode. The special thing is that you have to switch between German and your first language or a learned foreign language several times in your speech. Every year there is a new theme that gives students between the ages of twelve and their early 20s plenty of space for personal experiences and positions that they would like to advocate for. This year’s theme is “Have a say, help shape things – my voice, my actions”.
In the 15th anniversary year of SAG’S MULTI, students from all over Austria and, for the first time, from South Tyrol were nominated to take part; 337 speakers made it from the preliminary round to the main round after their presentations were evaluated. In the next step, 168 students made it into the final round. 38 languages were spoken in combination with German throughout the competition, and 30 languages were used in the final round, including English, Turkish, Dari, Arabic, Chinese, Punjabi, Urdu and Norwegian. SAG’S MULTI records a high level of participation from girls: in the anniversary year, 70 percent of the speakers were female.
Around 100 jurors, chaired by Peter Wesely, on whose initiative SAG’S MULTI was founded in 2009, evaluated the students’ speeches in changing constellations over nine days in Graz, Innsbruck, St. Pölten, Linz, Eisenstadt and Vienna :Inside.
Federal President Dr. Alexander Van der Bellen, who also took over the honorary protection of SAG’S MULTI, opened the final round with a video message.
ORF reporting on the 15th anniversary of SAG’S MULTI
With the multilingual speech competition SAG’S MULTI, the ORF as organizer is offering young people a large stage for the fourth time and is supporting the initiative with contributions on television and radio. All speech competitions could be followed via live stream on the ORF TVthek and are still available there on demand. ORF III will also broadcast excerpts from the closing ceremony on June 17th in a “Culture Today Special” with a time delay.
Cooperation partners make SAG’S MULTI possible
As cooperation partners, the Federal Chancellery, the HS Timber Group, the City of Vienna, the Vienna Chamber of Labor, the Austrian Chamber of Commerce, the Association of Industrialists, Raiffeisen Lower Austria-Vienna and the Austrian Association of Cities contribute to the implementation of the speech competition. ORF’s partner in organizing the events for the first time is the Upper Austrian event agency ANKLANG.
All further information, including the final round venues, start times and participation options, can be found at https://sagsmulti.ORF.at/