Calhoun Model UN Students Attend Conference in New Jersey

Exhausted yet exhilarated, a small group of Model United Nations students from Calhoun High School returned from a four-day conference on Dec. 5. 

Located in Princeton, New Jersey and organized by students from Princeton University, the Princeton Model United Nations Conference (PMUNC) brought together more than 1,100 delegates from all over the world. 

Previously, Calhoun's Model United Nations had only attended the March National High School Model United Nations Conference (NHSMUN) in New York City; however, the group received a limited invitation to attend this winter's PMUNC in New Jersey.

Representing Kuwait in the both the Legal (Ryan Kolberg and Michael Sambolin) and League of Arab States (Emma McNamara and Jocelyn Yu), as well as playing crucial roles in several special "crisis" committees, Calhoun's group of 10 delegates had an eye-opening experience. 

Crisis committees, for which students must submit an application long in advance, are a novel spin on the typical United Nations (UN) committees, which may meet in groups of up to 200 delegates.  Crisis committees meet in groups of approximately fifteen delegates and students do not necessarily represent a country. 

Calhoun students took crisis roles on the Black Garden: Joint Crisis on the Caucus II (Nicholas Caruso); the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (Jeffrey Caso and Larsen Volk); Saor Éire: Cabinet of the Irish Republic, 1919 (Andrew Leich); the Consejo de Ministros de España, 1983 (Justin Schmierer); and the Multilateral Summit on North Korea (Garrett Brucia).

At 1 a.m., only about an hour following the recess of the evening's meetings, delegates from several of these committees were called for a "midnight crisis."  In 10 minutes, the students had to dress themselves in typical Western business attire and report to their committee rooms for an urgent meeting that lasted until 4 a.m. 

For the delegates in the crisis committees, every day brought something new and unpredictable.  In one crisis in the Consejo de Ministros de España, 1983, which was conducted completely in Spanish, delegates had to restructure themselves to deal with the death of one of their cabinet members. 

In one crisis in the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia, several members of the prosecution were arrested by INTERPOL and had to deal with the "prisoner's dilemma" – later, several testimonies had to be stricken from the record when it was discovered that there was a participant in the trial who was engaged in witness intimidation and bribery. 

In one crisis in the Multilateral Summit on North Korea, delegates had to deal with the profound, imminent threat of nuclear warfare, which reflects the tensions of the present-day conflict.

When all was said and done, students had made great strives toward international cooperation and diplomacy.  One committee successfully put Kosovo and Taiwan on the road to UN membership, whilst one of the crisis committees successfully convicted a criminal of war crimes in the Bosnian genocide. 

Formal policy created in these committee meetings are actually applicable to the real world and arguably could resolve many of today's global conflicts.  In total, delegates attended nearly 25 hours of committee sessions and spent every second pondering the realms of international diplomacy.

At the closing ceremony, Calhoun delegate Jeffrey Caso received a verbal commendation for his work as a prosecutor in the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia, as well as an honorable mention in the PMUNC essay contest. 

This coming March, Calhoun Model United Nations, a group composed of almost 60 hard-working students, will represent Pakistan and Ukraine at NHSMUN, as well as various roles in other special crisis committees.

This article was written by Jeffrey Caso and edited by Sharissa Khan, club advisor to the Calhoun Model United Nations.