Model UN Group Travels to Duke University
On the cold dreary morning of November 10, more than 30 AIS students gathered outside the front doors of our school at 8 a.m., waiting for a bus that would take them to Duke University. These were not seniors on a college visit; this was a delegation of 9th and 10th graders that would soon be representing a country’s views on international issues facing the UN today. They probably had never visited that country or known what their foreign policy was. This group of students was the Duke Model United Nations (MUN) club. Forfeiting a day off school and their weekend, these dedicated students were immediately immersed in the conference and the complicated yet elegant process of diplomacy. For the next three and a half days they worked from 7 a.m. to well past midnight on mock crises and received only short reprieves from the consecutive four-hour committee sessions. The delegates all received hands-on experience in lobbying, negotiation, consensus building, resolution writing, public speaking, debate, and parliamentary procedure.
The conference was a huge success for AIS. They passed a number of major resolutions on topics varying from regional security to toxic waste and were major movers and shakers. Patrick Flaherty won honorable mention within the World Health Organization delegation even though he was forced to change committee and country a week before the conference. Elliott Flautt won outstanding delegate in the World Bank delegation. Finally Colin Hill and Mia Palmer took home the gavel for Best Delegation on General Assembly 3, the highest award given at MUN, and they were selected over 40 other delegations! The good news does not stop there: they received a second delegation for The Hague International Model United Nations, the largest MUN in the world, upon their return. On any account, even with the benefit of an international background, AIS students did an outstanding job.