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Date: 3/20/2019
WILBRAHAM – When people representing nations from around the globe gather to discuss the political challenges and issues that plague the world, they are usually experienced diplomats and foreign dignitaries. On Feb. 23, however, those negotiating political intricacies were middle schoolers.
The Wilbraham Monson Academy Middle School participated in the Worcester Area Model United Nations (WooMUN) for the first time this year. Model UN is a program in which students roleplay as delegates from the various member-states of the United Nations. WooMUN is a Model UN conference run by undergraduate students at Clark University.
“It is about getting students to identify the world’s problems and how they came to be, and most importantly, propose their own innovative solutions,” states the conference’s website, woomun.org.
Fabienne Dubois, the Model UN team instructor at WMA Middle School, prepared her students by bringing in a guest speaker, having WMA Upper School Model UN students tutor the younger kids, and visiting the Model UN program at Clark University. She even took them on a tour of the United Nations Building in New York City.
The team of nine WMA students were required to research issues ahead of time, “including the origins of the problem, the causes and consequences, and the decisions made by the international community to solve the issue,” said Dubois. They prepared opening statements, learned terminology specific to UN parliamentary procedure, and worked with one another and with students from other Model UN teams from around the region during the one-day conference.
“It was great that [the students] had to think globally about the impact of their decisions. It made students a lot more aware of what is going on in the world. It was definitely an eye-opener,” said Dubois.
The students’ hard work paid off. Sally Geoghegan, of Wilbraham, won the Most Informed Delegate Award for her presentation to the Human Rights Council.
“I loved the research portion of it. My topic was the annexation of Crimea. I found that so interesting. There were so many sides of the issue. Madame Dubois was so supportive and helped us out so much,” said Geoghegan.
“It’s very impressive. She was competing with kids who were older and who have been there before. A lot of them were experienced. For us, it was our first time. To win an award is big.
“There were 100 students total, and only a few awards. I was so glad she got it. She did a good job preparing and put in the extra time,” Fabienne continued, noting all the student’s hard work.
“For their first time, they did an awesome job. They tried to participate, they spoke, they listened a lot, and in the end, they said they all want to do it again. They’re awesome kids and a good team,” Dubois said.
“We were all a bit nervous, but once we started it became less nerve-wracking and we relaxed a bit. I think that helped our performance. It was also fun to interact with the other delegates from the other schools,” said Geoghegan. “It was so much fun.”