Junior Adam Tapper earned first place in the 2024-25 Illinois High School Translation Competition organized by the European Union Center at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Adam was honored at an awards ceremony hosted by the Consul General of Germany on Dec. 6.
Adam studies German and is also a part of the Ouroboros Review, U-High’s literary translation journal.
Reflecting on the experience, Adam said, “It was definitely a surprise to win this award. A lot of previous winners had been native speakers, which I am not.”
For the competition, Adam was tasked with translating the opening pages of “Klarkommen,” a German novel not previously translated into English.
Adam explained, “It was not a novel I had heard of before, and it’s not published in an English translation, so I couldn’t reference previous English translations at all.”
Kate Oakes • Dec 16, 2024 at 9:41 am
Congratulations to Adam! Incredible accomplishment, especially for a non-native speaker AND even more especially for a student who only started studying German in 9th grade! His incredible teachers (Frau Pralle and Frau Zemil) must be so proud of him. Too bad Lab has chosen to cut this incredible world language program when its students shine.