USN Students Provide Hope at Model United Nations

USN's long association with this conference has created a tradition of success, as USN students frequently get recognized for their accomplishments at this conference. This year's batch of delegates lived up to that tradition while the backdrop of international events reminded them of the immediacy of the issues confronting the global community.

USN students participated in almost every component of the MUN conference, from representing countries in the General Assembly, to representing countries in the Security Council, to positions in the UN Secretariat, to the Department of Public Information or "press corps" for the conference. 

In the Security Council, seniors Starina D'souza and Sam Fisher represented Jordan and Luxembourg, respectively, and for her efforts Starina was nominated for the award for Outstanding Security Council delegate.

In the UN Secretariat, seniors Fidan Baycora, Aidan Rowan, and Jacob Snyder served as Commissioners of various UN agencies and during the conference debated UN policies and programs and worked with the General Assembly delegations to promote resolutions that advanced those policies. For his efforts as the UN Commissioner for the Prevention of Genocide, Rowan won the Outstanding Secretary Award!

In the Department of Public Information, senior Jordan Burnett and junior Kevin Chen worked with other students to record and report the workings of the conference and relevant international events in the conference newsletter and video broadcast. For his efforts, Jordan Burnett won the Outstanding Press Member Award for the Print division!

Most students participated in the General Assembly, working in small groups to represent countries as they present and debate resolutions that would guide international responses to various issues. This year's conference saw a lively blend of grizzled veterans and energetic newcomers representing a variety of nations that presented resolutions on an equally varied range of international problems. Seniors Youssef Doss, Fred Crumbo, Bradford Johnson, and Mitchell Coverstone, representing Andorra, won an Outstanding Resolution Award, as did 9th graders Ella Steinhilber, Sarah Stack, and Alex Dano, representing Peru. (Ella, Sarah, and Alex were actually Peru #2--the conference is so popular among high schools in Tennessee that some countries' delegations are doubled.)

The USN delegations representing Syria 2 (another doubled delegation comprised of sophomores Cooper Standard, Henry Standard, Elijah Hong, and Jackson Joffe), Barbados (9th graders Jolie Diskin, Grace Rieniets, and Daley Hall), South Africa (ninth graders Jake Wolfson, Evan Rork, Ittai Eden, and Daniel Jacobs), Papua New Guinea (juniors Alice May and Trudy Zou, and senior Sarah Young), and Belarus (seniors Molly Pennington, Joe Noser, and Willem Wheeler) were all ranked among the top four resolutions (out of more than 20) in their committees and were placed on the docket for the General Assembly's consideration. 

USN students made their marks individually as well. For their participation in the debates on the resolutions in the General Assembly, 9th graders Annie French and Shriya Karam and sophomore Alya Zouaoui were nominated for Outstanding Statesman Awards.

The Outstanding Statesman Award winners from USN were seniors Youssef Doss (his third consecutive Model UN Outstanding Statesman Award) and Tom Shaw, junior Alice May, sophomore Jessica Mei, and 9th grader Grace Rieniets.

And last but not least, after four years of struggle against the Evil Quiz Bowl Empire of Hume-Fogg, the USN "A Team" of Doss, Rowan, Snyder, and junior Alex Morgan won the coveted World Cup trivia trophy by crushing Hume-Fogg's trivia team in the finals. An unnamed source asserted, but was unable to verify, that Morgan beat the Hume-Fogg team through his answers alone, while his teammates' responses iced the metaphorical cake.

So another Model UN confernece is in the books! Students interested in participating in this spring's Youth In Government (YIG) conference, a simulation of Tennessee state government, should contact Mr. Luffman as soon as possible.