Our elementary delegates had a very inspiring and enriching experience at the Montessori Model United Nations 2016 in Rome in May. This year, the 4 school teams chose to represent Ethiopia, India, Indonesia and the USA.
As they attended the various meetings, debates and discussions, the delegates truly appreciated the value of all the research and preparation they had to undertake in the weeks leading up to the conference. Many of them felt that sitting on the committees such as UNICEF, United Nations Environment Assembly (UNEA) and Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO) on behalf of their chosen countries helped them to grasp what is means to represent a country, have your voice heard and participate in negotiations to come to an agreement that benefits both your country and the world. Whereas earlier, they knew about food waste or climate change, they now truly understand the meaning and impact of these concepts.
This year both the Hampstead and Bayswater Elementary classes were represented and everyone was amazed by how much they learnt in the few days that they were at the conference. “In the beginning, I didn’t know what ‘finding a resolution’ actually meant but at the end, I was proud to be one of the members who presented their team’s resolution to the group”, said one of the first time participants!
The social aspect of interacting with children from many different countries was considered to be the best part of the conference along with the cultural evening where they had to showcase their home country.
They may have just returned but everyone is already looking forward to the MMUN 2017!
We would like to thank all the children, parents and staff of the Elementary classes for their MMUN fundraising efforts earlier this year. The book sale, raffle draw and pop-up coffee mornings were very popular and the proceeds contributed to towards helping more children to travel as part of the team.