Chen Yixian, champion in the competition's college category, delivers a speech during the finals on March 24, 2019. [Photo provided to chinadaily.com.cn]

The 24th China Daily "21st Century·Coca-Cola Cup" National English Speaking Competition and the 17th China Daily "21st Century·VIPKID Cup" National High School and Primary School English Speaking Competition concluded in Hangzhou, East China's Zhejiang province, on Sunday.

More than 500 contestants broke into the finals to orate their ideas and stories after a half-year of screening and preliminaries across the country among tens of thousands of passionate English learners.

Launched in 1996, the competition evolved from a single contest for college students to a comprehensive event that includes student contestants as young as kindergarteners, and has been regarded by educators as a good platform to improve young Chinese people's storytelling ability in English.

Chen Yixian, a Tsinghua University student, won the championship in the college group and will represent China to compete in the International Public Speaking Competition hosted by the English-Speaking Union in London in May.

"The competition helped build up my confidence, and as I major in physics, I hope to deliver a speech about my scientific projects to the world in the future," he said.