113 middle and high school aged delegates, donning their crisp black jackets, flag-speckled ties and kitten-heeled shoes, steadily streamed into Doc Wilson Hall. Chirps of anxious excitement echoed through the auditorium as the delegates sat down just before the first moments of the opening ceremony. Plastic-enrobed name tags rustled with movement, gifting their owners with a day-long alias. The gavel strikes: once, twice.
“Are there any motions on the floor?” requests a secretary-general.
“Motion to call MASMUNC II to session,” an eager contestant responds.
The Model United Nations (MUN) club held its second annual conference, MASMUNC II, at Masters on Dec. 2, 2023. The day-long conference hosted nine schools from the New York-New Jersey region, including the Grace Church School from downtown Manhattan, The Storm King School from Cornwall-on-Hudson, and the Verona Public School District from Verona, New Jersey.
Open to all levels, the competition included participants with a wide range of experience, from first-time middle school representatives to seasoned upper school students working in the more advanced JCC: China and JCC: USA committees. Of the 10 committees, three were at the middle school level.
“Each different type of committee we tried to do in a more tiered style. So if you wanted to do crisis, and you had never done a crisis before, you could do a beginner level crisis. Or, if you were more experienced…you could have the chance to be challenged,” said senior Violet Paull, co-president of Masters MUN and secretary-general for MASMUNC II.
Paull and MUN Secretary Sophie Moussapour both explained that the overarching goal of MASMUNC II was to produce a different experience from typically hyper-competitive regional conferences. By creating an inviting atmosphere for delegates at all levels, the hope was that participants could deepen their understanding and appreciation of Model UN.
“Our focus was to create a really warm and welcoming learning environment that kind of reflected our [club’s] values and our school’s mission.” Moussapour, junior and four-year member of MUN continued, “We’ve received a lot of positive feedback with people saying that it’s a really great place for their delegates to go and to learn, and that the environment is much more welcoming [than other regional day conferences].”
Moussapour recalled an unconventional moment in one of the middle school committees. “I stepped into a couple of middle school rooms in which the chairs were literally teaching their kids Model UN procedure and things like that,” she said.
Bobby Callagy, middle school MASMUNC II secretary general oversaw the middle school committees High Fashion and Star Wars, and chaired the G20 Summit. “My goal was to make sure that we put an emphasis on middle schoolers, especially this year, and try to make sure that they were fully supported and given the same experience as high schoolers were given [during MASMUNC I],” he said.
“Middle school committees especially were a place of learning and trying to gain experience in the Model UN world,” Callagy, senior and chair of middle school MUN explained. “Since a lot of the middle schoolers that did come were much younger and didn’t have as much experience, it was experiential learning.”
According to Paull, who also aimed to use MASMUNC II to nurture collaboration within the club, every member of Masters’ MUN team was involved – either as a constituent of conference staff or as a participating delegate.
Noah Adler ‘27 vice-chaired the JCC: China committee. MASMUNC II was his first time chairing, and second ever Model UN conference. He said, “It [chairing] was a lot. But I definitely learned some new things about [crisis committees] and also how to handle chairing or co-chairing a committee. Watching Lucas [Camacho ‘25] chair [gave] me some insight into what I might do in the future.”
Adler, who joined MUN this year, continued, “It was a lot of bouncing off the MUN commands to the note spreadsheet that I had, and trying to also communicate with backroom. So it was a lot of work and it was pretty challenging to keep up. But as time went on, it became easier and easier.”
Looking ahead to MASMUNC III, for which planning begins in spring 2024, Paull hopes to grow the conference beyond just members of the club. She said, “I think expanding [participating] delegates, like kids who don’t do Model UN to being a delegate, would definitely be something we’d like to see.”
