AZARIA Wray recently walked away the champion of the 2011 Western Union National Primary Schools’ English Competition.

This, after the 11-year-old student of St Richard’s Primary achieved the highest score — 91 per cent — of the competition.

“I feel humbled and I want to congratulate my colleagues who were placed second and third in the competition. I did my best, but my colleagues (also) did very well,” she told Career & Education following her win.

“They studied hard and we all deserve to be winners. If only I could share this trophy,” Wray added.

For her efforts, the young student — who was also selected as the parish champion for St Andrew — walked away with a scholarship valued $50,000, trophies and gift baskets from GraceKennedy Limited — operators of Western Union Remittance Services, title sponsor of the competition. The awards ceremony was held at the Terra Nova All-Suite Hotel in Kingston on June 20.

Shaquille Farquharson and Kayla Wright, also of St Richards Primary, were awarded second and third place respectively Farquharson received $30,000 while Wright received $20,000, complete with individual trophies and gift baskets.

Rashaun Crutchly of Kensington Primary School and Rashida Reid Lyssons Primary were placed fourth and fifth respectively.

More than 250 grade six students from across the island entered the four-year-old competitio, with teachers encouraged to enter a maximum of three students from each school. On April 20, the entrants were required to sit an English language test, similar to that of the English language exam sat in the Grade Six Achievement Test.

After the average of the three students from each school was calculated, St Richard’s Primary emerged the top performer with 89.67 per cent. The institution was awarded a cash prize of $20,000 while teacher Eulie Mantock, who trained the students, was awarded $25,000.

Kensington Primary School in St Catherine received the second highest average and were awarded $15,000 in book vouchers. Howard Cooke Primary School in Montego Bay received the third highest average and was awarded $10,000 in book vouchers.

The Western Union National Primary Schools’ English Competition is a feature of the Western Union I PLEDGE programme, an initiative of GraceKennedy Group. Since the start of the year, I PLEDGE organisers have hosted a reading week as well as a debate series and will, before yearend, implement a computerisation programme, offering a number of Jamaican schools a share of $10-million worth of desktop computers.