The Tokyo Cement All Island Schools Quiz 2013, a multi-million rupee brain game amongst schools across Sri Lanka, came to an exciting finale on March 23rd in an epic battle between the blue-and-golds, and red-and-golds. Two of Colombo’s top boy’s schools that survived intense mental melees for months, met in a final show down that ended with the blues taking home one million rupees in prize money.
The programme saw the cleverest school children from across the island, pitting their intelligence against each other for over one year. The finals saw the four teams reduced to two, with the champions from the hill capital, Mahamaya Girls School and Dharmaraja of Kandy, being defeated by Ananda and Royal from Colombo. On Sunday, parents and children watched the decisive finals that left one team standing as the best of the best of Sri Lanka’s public education system. In a close race that saw the teams going head to head in almost all three rounds, Royal College, Colombo, beat Ananda College with a narrow margin.
“We congratulate the Royal College quiz team on their victory and we say well done for a game well played, to the Ananda College quiz team,” said Billy Walpola, Director Marketing of Tokyo Cement.
Keeping its promise Tokyo Cement presented the victors, Royal College, with a one million rupee cheque and the runners up, Ananda College, with an Rs 500,000 cheque. The company also presented the four members and two back up members of the Royal College quiz team with Samsung Tablet computers. The six Anandians were gifted Titan watches amidst the cheers of school mates and smiles of proud teachers. The school authorities stated that the winnings will go into the respective School Funds at Royal and Ananda, and will be used for school improvement activities.
Accepting their prizes, the captains of the two teams Kaveendra Pathirage, from Ananda College, and Archanath Dikwella, from Royal College, thanked their school authorities and colleagues, for supporting their teams. Dikwella noted that the quiz had been a unique experience as it had been broadcast islandwide over the television.
With the conclusion of this mega competition, Tokyo Cement and its media partner Swarnavahini, are already planning a comeback.
“We are encouraged by the positive response we have received from educationalists in the country. We are also very happy with the success of our first quiz programme, which was a major project involving complex logistics, due to its all island coverage. We hope to see more schools participating in the Tokyo Cement All Island Schools Quiz season two, when it returns in 2014,” said Walpola.
Tokyo Cement, who initiated the quiz programme to encourage the pursuit of knowledge through academic competitiveness, has already invested over Rs 5.2 million in the project as prize money and over Rs 22 million, in support services. To ensure that children from any part of the country, rural or urban, were given an equal opportunity to participate and display their mental capabilities, Tokyo Cement and the Ministry of Education invited all 9,700 public schools in Sri Lanka, to enter the competition. This resulted in 532 schools sending their intellectual champions to show their mental prowess. Tokyo Cement distributed Rs 100,000 each, to 24 out of 32 schools that reached national level competitions. While the balance eight schools entered the quarter finals, four lost the mental skirmish, but were gifted Rs 200,000 each. Out of the remaining four, two schools were ousted in the semi-finals and were awarded Rs 250,000 each. This Sunday, the two finalists made history by winning two of the largest rewards for a quiz programme in Sri Lanka.
