For the fifth year, Saint Mary’s Orthodox college has participated in the Model United Nations program held in LAU which is a simulation to what actually happens in the UN. First, students attend 6 training sessions where they learn the functions of the UN, proper research methods, public speaking skills, negotiating skills, and the way a real conference in the UN is conducted. Then, each school is assigned a country or two where students, distributed among different committees, state this country’s position and defend it in the conference that lasts for two days.
Sixteen students (from grade 10 and 11) from our school participated in MUN representing Senegal and Guinea Bissau. During the conference, we had to be true ambassadors to our assigned countries where we defended them, asked for their rights, and shed light on their problems that we managed to solve at the end. As usual Saint Mary’s students excelled and showed uniqueness in the conference and that reflected in the eight awards that they won. Petra Chidiac, Rouba Rizk, and Omar Zmerli won a “Diplomacy Award” for demonstrating excellence in representation and distinguished performance and they competed with other award winning delegates in a conference where the winners get to go to New York and compete with students from around the world. Hala Moustafa, Dima Makarem, Ghassan Faour, Tala al Kadi, and Najwa Hassouna won a “Position Paper” award for presenting an organized and well- researched paper clearly showing their country’s position. Students also participated in the “Global Village” where they organized, with the help of many volunteers, a marvelous stand presenting the tasty food of Senegal and they performed the Senegalese folk dance with the help of Aicha, a Senegalese that was proud of the students of Saint Mary’s Orthodox for their great work in representing Senegal.
MUN has been a remarkable experience that taught us many useful skills which enhanced our personalities and raised our self esteem, and on top of that, it was so much fun. We advise everyone to participate in it.
Petra Chidiac
Grade: 11 S “B”
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