My name is Han Joo, and I am representing the United Kingdom in the Security Council, along with my good friend, Julius. The Security Council discusses topics such as, "Immediate Response to Cyber Attacks", and the "Authorization of the Investigation of Chemical Weapons in Syria". One thing that happened during the debate today was that there were so many questions to the Chair, who moderates the whole discussion, (these are also known as POIs, or Points of Information, and are basically an opportunity for a delegate to speak to the Chair or another delegate, generally to ask a question or request). I don’t know if the other delegates were not used to the system of the Security Council, but there were a lot of POIs! Something I found really interesting were the P5 Caucuses. A P5 Caucus is a private discussion between the five permanent voting members of the Security Council: China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom, and the United States. They were more intense than any other discussions we had - so intense that chairs had to moderate the private discussion. Just taking the time to sit quietly and observe the debate was very exciting as well. That is something I am very looking forward for tomorrow - more intense debates! In addition, I learned about Security Council procedure, which turns out to be a little different than General Assembly (another important committee) procedure. One main difference is that the Security Council uses ‘clause by clause’ debate (debating one solution at a time), and General Assembly uses ‘resolution as a whole’ debate (debating all the solutions at once). This is my second MY-MUNOFS in middle school so far, and everything has been great; people at the conference are kind, and this is great for developing our MUN skills for other upcoming conferences, such as MYMUN. MUN helped me grow my confidence in public speaking, as well as communicating and negotiating with others to reach an agreement.
~Han Joo Kim, 8
Together with my partner, Han Joo, I represented the United Kingdom in the UN Security Council. The UN Security Council's mission is to maintain international peace and security. Today we talked about solutions for world problems, like “Authorization for an investigation of chemical weapons in Syria” and “Immediate response to cyber attacks”. One accomplishment I achieved today, was asking a point of information (POI). My goal was to ask multiple POIs, but unfortunately, I did not get recognized by the chair as many times as I hoped, or my POI was answered by another delegate before I got the opportunity to state it. We had some very experienced people in my committee, which led to some heated debate, and was very fun to watch. One interesting and fun thing that I experienced today was "veto power". Being one of the P5 nations (the five permanent voting nations in the Security Council, and the only ones who have veto power) made voting ‘for’ and ‘against’ a lot harder, as you do not want to use veto power all the time, hence we ‘abstained’ from voting most of the time. Multiple times during debate we had what is called the “P5 caucus” , which is basically a meeting for only the P5 nations. During these meetings, we discussed how we were going to vote and what our stance on the issue was. One thing I learned today was that you have to be careful when you make your speech, as other delegates can easily turn something against you. One thing I especially was nervous about was making my opening speech, as it was in front of a lot of people. When I walked up to the podium and got ready to speak, I was both scared and nervous, but when I first got to talk my nervous started to relax and I felt confident again. One thing I’m really excited about for tomorrow is debating the resolution I created with my fellow delegates. So far, my experience has been great. I have gained a lot of new friends (Instagram followers) and gotten a better understanding of MUN procedure. MUN is important for me because it helps me to gain better public-speaking skills, confidence, learn how to negotiate to find agreements that benefit all sides, and of course, getting better at debating!
~Julius Lehmann
Hi, my name is Autumn Lourdes Gilmore. I am in grade 6, which means that this is my first conference. This conference is in Singapore, at the school Overseas Family School (OFS). I am in the committee for UNICEF, which stands for United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund. In this committee, we are talking about 4 topics, which are: reducing child labor, preventing the spread of cholera, ending the practice of underage marriage, and measures to advance educational opportunity and access for children with disabilities. If you don’t know what cholera is, it is a disease that can be passed on to other people or communities by the water they drink, often from rivers. Here is a video about cholera if you would like to know more about it.
I have had several accomplishments, but my main accomplishments were on the first day of debate, where I did 2 speeches on my first day! Overall, the conference was good because it helped me improve things that I wasn’t sure about; even if I was bad at first, after 1 speech I started improving my speaking skills. I got better and better after each time I spoke up to make a speech or POI, which means "Point of Information". MUN is important to me because it helps me overcome challenges such as speaking in front of a bunch of people or delegates. Another reason why MUN is important to me is because you will get to see other delegates perspectives or opinions about different problems in the world. I am going to leave you with a quote by John F. Kennedy, which states, “Children are the world’s most valuable resource and its best hope for the future”
~Autumn Gilmore, 6
~Julius Lehmann
Hi, my name is Autumn Lourdes Gilmore. I am in grade 6, which means that this is my first conference. This conference is in Singapore, at the school Overseas Family School (OFS). I am in the committee for UNICEF, which stands for United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund. In this committee, we are talking about 4 topics, which are: reducing child labor, preventing the spread of cholera, ending the practice of underage marriage, and measures to advance educational opportunity and access for children with disabilities. If you don’t know what cholera is, it is a disease that can be passed on to other people or communities by the water they drink, often from rivers. Here is a video about cholera if you would like to know more about it.
I have had several accomplishments, but my main accomplishments were on the first day of debate, where I did 2 speeches on my first day! Overall, the conference was good because it helped me improve things that I wasn’t sure about; even if I was bad at first, after 1 speech I started improving my speaking skills. I got better and better after each time I spoke up to make a speech or POI, which means "Point of Information". MUN is important to me because it helps me overcome challenges such as speaking in front of a bunch of people or delegates. Another reason why MUN is important to me is because you will get to see other delegates perspectives or opinions about different problems in the world. I am going to leave you with a quote by John F. Kennedy, which states, “Children are the world’s most valuable resource and its best hope for the future”
~Autumn Gilmore, 6
MY-MUNOFS is a 3-day conference that took place at Overseas Family School in Singapore. When on the bus to take us from the hotel to the conference, I took deep breaths and told myself to stay calm. Once I got off the bus, I was nervous and sweaty. I had already gone to the workshop and the meet and greet the previous day, so I already knew most of the people who were in my committee, ECOSOC II (Economic & Social Council, 2nd Committee). I was representing the United Kingdom, which meant I was going to debate in the UK’s stance on a variety of world issues. After I found the room, my committee would debate in, I took a seat and the chairs did a roll call. Now it would soon be time to do our opening speeches! An opening speech is like a short speech (about 1 minute long) that basically introduces yourself, the issues you are focusing on and your country’s stance. Speaking order was alphabetical, so I was the third to the last delegate to give a speech. MORAL OF THIS STORY: Being last just makes you nervous until the end. Next time, if possible, just get it over with! The opening speeches went well, and afterward we started the lobbying process in order to merge and create resolutions to the issues we would be debating. I was paired with two 8th graders and two 9th graders. After working on the resolution for a little more than an hour, we had a break and came back. After finishing with lunch and coming back to finish the resolution, we were finally going to start debating. Our first debate was on the issue of fishing quotas. During this debate, I made two points of information (POIs) and an amendment that passed! After this we had another break, and then we started our second debate on the topic of women's rights. As this was not my main topic, I only managed two get three points of information out. Overall, the meeting was fun and definitely was a great learning experience.
~Leon Ritz, 6
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