Une Compétition Française!

Maclay French Students Attend Le Congrès De La Culture Française en Floride

Photo by Cindy Stockstill

On March 6–8, a group of seven of Maclay upper school French students traveled to Orlando to compete in Le Congrès De La Culture Française en Floride. Congrès, founded in 1952, is the largest high school French competition in Florida today. An annual tradition, Congrès is an interactive way for Maclay students to test their French skills. The competition has a specific theme each year, and the theme of 2025 was “la nourriture” or “food.” Maclay’s team competed in a total of six competitions in the individual and group categories in which they earned a ranking of bon, excellente or supérieur.

For individuals, the Marauders competed in Déclamation (poetry recitation) and Lecture (multiple choice test). For group competitions, Maclay participated in Album (photo album), Projet (creative project), Piece de Theatre (10-minute skit) and Casse-tete (French trivia game). Maclay’s album was a collection of photographs of Marauders participating in French activities and creative pages highlighting aspects of the yearly theme. The school’s project was an interactive map of France’s regions featuring the specialty foods of each region.

Maclay’s casse-tete team consisted of three students who competed against one other school in a brain- bowl-style competition. Maclay’s rankings for these competitions included nine “bon,” three “excellente” and four “supérieur.”