Sumitomo Group Public Affairs Committee supported The 76^th Speech Contest of The Schools for the Blind (hosted by Mainichi Newspaper Co., Ltd. Tenji Mainichi) which was held on Oct. 19^th, 2007 at the Central Hiroshima Special Support School in Hiroshima. This speech contest has marked its 76^th anniversary observing the tradition since its establishment in 1928. The nine blind student representatives who had won the elimination contest from seven districts, made passionate speeches about future dreams, purpose of life and ordinary feelings with their own words, aiming for the championship flag from the Minister of Education and Science and the Tenji Mainichi Cup.

All of speakers who won the district contests in the country each delivered impressive speeches. In this traditional contest, the winner of the nationwide contest, which was a fierce battle, was Naoki Mitsui, delegate of The Kinki region. He had to quit his job which he had lived for, because of an eye disease. He then entered a blind school with a broken heart; however he heard the school song and it gave him pleasure and passion to work and live again, especially the line from the song and the name of his speech: “The Working Pleasure Bears Fruit”. Then, as part of his speech, he sang the school song with a resonantly powerful voice and the hall was surrounded by his force and passion. Work, studies, sports, and social issues, etc. other speakers also spoke about their way of life; thoughts and zeal for live were delivered with warmth and touched the audience in attendance.

“Passing important values from people to people”. This is a group message of Sumitomo Group Public Affairs Committee. We want to tell of desire and it will be told in a "word". We feel this speech contest makes a deep impression when we put our heart to the “word” and spread it from person to person.“Impression”. This is another suitable word to express the Speech Contest of School for the Blind. From now on, the Sumitomo Group Public Affairs Committee would like to keep supporting this Speech Contest of the Schools for the Blind which has been giving us a good impression with the message “Passing important values from people to people”.

Sumitomo Group Public Affairs Committee presented the 1st-place winner with the Sumitomo Group Cup. Moreover, three winners from 1^st to 3^rd place were presented with overseas study tours as supplementary prizes. All nine participants were presented with the memento of a portable CD player as a performance award.