The English Festival 2006 will take place from March to May next year. Funding applications to run events to raise public interest in the learning and use of English should be submitted by August 31, the Standing Committee on Language Education & Research says.

Following the successful debut of the English Festival earlier this year, SCOLAR has decided to keep up the momentum with another festival in 2006.

SCOLAR said it is effective to promote the importance of English through activities like music, drama, sports, games, language arts, and other fun and creative activities.

Parties interested in organising activities for the English Festival 2006 should submit their proposal by post or in person to the SCOLAR Support Unit, Room 934, 9/F, Wu Chung House, 213 Queen's Road East, Wan Chai before 5pm on August 31. Late, faxed or emailed submissions will not be accepted.

Detailed guidelines are available at the English Festival website. In particular, the following should be noted:

* the organiser must be a local organisation with experience, capability and capacity to organise territory-wide English activities/programmes;

*activities/programmes must be non-profit-making in nature and targeted at the general public in Hong Kong, and may be conducted before the end of August, 2006, with major events to be held during the festival period from March through May; and,

* a panel of SCOLAR members will vet proposals based on the criteria of cost-effectiveness, creativity, feasibility, number of beneficiaries and the proponent's experience in organising similar events in the past.

For enquiries, please contact Calvin Chan at 2892 6549 or Marco Yim at 2892 6558, or by email to: mailto:eassu4@emb.gov.hk or pcssu2@emb.gov.hk.

7 activities drew 20,000 participants

The first English Festival was held between April and May this year, with seven activity programmes to prompt students and people of different ages and educational backgrounds to learn and use English in ways they would enjoy the most.

Combined activities attracted 20,000 participants and more than 1.6 million viewers tuned in for the TV programme.