MODEL UNITED NATIONS

MODEL MENTORS

FOREIGN POLICY SIMULATION PROGRAM FACILITATES CROSS-DIVISIONAL CONNECTIONS

“I chose to serve as a mentor because I'm passionate about Model UN, and I wanted to help Middle Schoolers develop the same love. I developed as a leader throughout the mentoring process—it made me love Model UN even more, and it helped me improve skills such as communication, research and writing.”

CLAIRE HOWELL ’21

For decades, Pace Academy Upper School students have participated in Model United Nations (MUN), a policy simulation program that requires that students research global issues—topics such as universal health care, deforestation in Sub-Saharan Africa and preventing nuclear war—and come together at models, simulations where students act as country ambassadors to the United Nations and other international bodies.

Participation in MUN involves extensive extracurricular research, writing and preparation, as well as an ability to speak confidently from a point of view that might not be one’s own. Students do not receive grades at the end of a model; the experience itself is the reward.

In recent years, MUN’s popularity has skyrocketed at Pace, thanks in large part to student leadership. Longtime MUN adviser and Upper School history teacher HELEN SMITH has welcomed the increased involvement. An executive board of student leaders now actively recruits and trains new members, organizes and teaches delegate workshops, helps orchestrate travel logistics and plans for the future of the program. In a typical year, 60 to 80 Upper School students might travel to five or six models. This year, however, has been anything but typical. Rather than jetting off to Prague or Lisbon to take part in international conferences as in years past, students were unable to travel due to the COVID pandemic. Nevertheless, the Model UN executive board— seniors ISABEL

BATTISTA

and MICHAEL FU and juniors KARGIL BEHL, LEAH FAVERO and RYAN VARMA—coordinated a virtual conference for Upper School MUN veterans in October and a mini MUN for seventh and eighth graders in January. A total of 30 Upper School delegates attended three virtual models—William and Mary, Yale and Georgetown—interacting online with advanced MUN students from around the world. Awards to senior LAURA ROMIG and sophomore KATE WEBB showed Pace students’ ability to compete in models with more than a thousand participants.

While the virtual conferences provided valuable experience, “We really wanted to give that ‘live’ experience to those who were new to Model UN,” Fu reports. In particular was a group of enthusiastic seventh and eighth graders who in October responded to a proposal from Varma. “At my previous school, Model UN started in the middle school,” says Varma, whose family moved to Atlanta from Singapore in early 2020. “I noticed that at Pace, there was a lot of training for freshmen. I thought we could cut down on that training if the Middle School program were more robust. I talked to Ms. Smith about it, and we presented the idea to the Middle School. To our surprise, nearly 40 students signed up.”

From January through April, 11 Upper School mentors, with help from Smith and faculty adviser MARTY HAMBURGER, met weekly with Middle School students, individually and in small groups, to introduce them to MUN, collaborate on short assignments and craft papers. “Model UN is challenging,” says Varma. “Explaining it can be complex. Unless you get your hands and feet in the water, you don’t understand it. Our Middle Schoolers hopped in there, took risks and did everything to the best of their abilities.”

Students’ hard work paid off in April when Middle and Upper School delegates

joined forces to participate in PACEMUNC II, a one-day, Pace-only model. Along with fellow faculty advisers DR. CHRISTINE CARTER, DR. DON DUPREE and DR. KAYLAN HAIZLIP, Smith, Hamburger and Upper School leaders executed the event without a hitch.

“It was so good,” Smith reports. “The Middle School students were as active and involved as the Upper School delegates, and some were really outstanding in both research and speaking.”

Battista, whose engagement with MUN began in Middle School, was equally awed. “I remember being really scared as an eighth grader,” she recalls. “All of these students were so involved. Everyone contributed to the debate, which doesn’t happen at a normal conference. I was very impressed.”

Middle School participants found the experience rewarding as well. “I learned how to research a country, think on my feet, create resolutions and partner with other delegates,” reports seventh-grader REESE HONEYCUTT. “I had a phenomenal experience interacting with Ms. Smith and the Upper School mentors. [Sophomore] EMMA BETH NEVILLE was the best mentor I could have asked for. She met with my group weekly and was super involved in making my first Model UN experience the best it could be.”

Behl would like to see the mentoring piece of the program continue and hopes that the joint Middle-Upper School model grows with each passing year. “We’re looking forward to a new group of leaders taking the reins,” he says. “The goal is to pass on this project but to be there to help when needed.”

That’s exactly what Smith has wanted to see. “From my point of view as a teacher for five decades, the most exciting part of Model UN is that you, the student, are in charge of your own learning,” she says. “You start working with others to learn skills, you figure out what is needed and how you best achieve it, and you gradually become an independent learner and speaker. We think that the self-directed, fact-based exploration of issues [through MUN] is what we need as citizens of our country and global citizens in the 21st century.” •

“In terms of student participation, Model UN is the largest club at Pace. That says a lot. It means that Pace students are curious and want to learn for the sake of learning.”

MICHAEL FU ’21

THANKS TO OUR MODEL UN MENTORS!

Isabel Battista ’21

Leah Favero ’22*

Eloise Gaudet ’23

Kathleen Glass ’22

Claire Howell ’21

Rebecca Kann ’22

Emma Beth Neville ’23*

Josie Swain ’23

Kate Webb ’23*

Mary Amelia Weiss ’23*

Jayla Wideman ’22

* Will join rising seniors

Kargil Behl and

Ryan Varma on the 2021–2022 Executive Board