MPU Students Win the First and Second Place in the 3rd Yunshan Cup International Interpreting Contest

MACAU, February 25 - The 3rd Yunshan Cup International Remote Interpreting Contest was jointly organised by the Guangdong University of Foreign Studies (GDUFS) and the Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterey under the guidance of the Association of International Conference Interpreters (AIIC), China Academy of Translation, the Interpreting Committee of the Translators Association of China, and the Network on Assessment and Evaluation of Interpreting. Students from the Faculty of Languages and Translation (FLT) of Macao Polytechnic University (MPU) achieved outstanding results in the contest, taking the Champion and First Runner-up in the Portuguese category, fully demonstrating MPU’s excellence in the field of Chinese-Portuguese interpreting.

The 3rd Yunshan Cup International Remote Interpreting Contest was divided into 16 language categories, including English, French, German, Spanish, Russian, Japanese, Korean, Vietnamese, Thai, Indian, Malaysian, Lao, Burmese, Cambodian, Portuguese and Italian. It attracted more than 4,000 contestants from home and abroad, including the Middlebury Institute of International Studies (USA), University of Leeds (UK), Macquarie University (Australia), Moscow University (Russia), Toulouse Institute of Political Studies (France), University of Venice (Italy), Seoul National University (South Korea), Hanoi University (Vietnam), Bangkok University (Thailand) and Macao Polytechnic University (Macao).

For the first time, Portuguese (consecutive interpreting) was included in this year’s competition. The outstanding performance of the participating students from FLT was unanimously recognised by the judges. Three postgraduate students from the Chinese-Portuguese Translation and Interpreting programme secured top honours: Zhao Qichao won the champion in the Portuguese Consecutive Interpreting category, Wang Xiaoyu the first runner-up (supervisor: Wang Xiaoyan), and Mo Wenshen the second prize.

Professor Zhang Yunfeng, Dean of FLT, said that the Master of Arts in Chinese-Portuguese Translation and Interpreting programme aims to nurture high-calibre Chinese-Portuguese translation and interpreting professionals. The programme integrates closely with cutting-edge technologies such as machine translation and artificial intelligence, and provides students with rich practice opportunities. Meanwhile, as the only partner of the Directorate General for Interpretation of the European Commission in China, the European Union interpreters are also deeply involved in the programme to provide professional counselling for students. Through systematic learning, students further improve their communication and translation skills, consolidate their professional language knowledge in different fields such as administration, law, business, film and television, and become high-level professional interpreters and translators who can adapt to the needs of the changing society.

Zhao Qichao said that through participating in the competition, he realised the strict requirements for interpreters’ professional knowledge in real-world interpreting. The systematic and practical exercises in the classroom have laid a solid foundation for students’ professional performance; under the time-limited and high-pressure competition environment, the participating students deeply appreciated the importance of improving their language proficiency and cross-cultural communication skills. The outstanding performance of other top contestants also broadened students’ global vision and would inspire further progress in their practical abilities in various fields.

Applications for the MA in Chinese-Portuguese Translation and Interpreting are now open. Interested applicants can submit their online application before 15 May 2025 via the admission page of MPU at mpu.mo/admission.