The Sandspur

Issue date: 2/28/08 Section: News

On February 14th, twelve students left Rollins campus at 4:00 a.m. and hopped on a plane to Boston to participate in Harvard's National Model UN.

The group, comprised of eleven freshmen and one sophomore, made up Rollins' Model UN team. The club was originally started by freshmen Omar Rachid and Ariane Rosen early this fall and over the past few months has gained many new participants who dared to spend their Thursday nights on the second floor of Ward discussing international politics.

The Model UN team spent hours educating themselves on political policies, writing position papers, and studying the format of Harvard's conference procedures in order to prepare them for their journey to one of the most prestigious Model UN conferences in the world, where they would not only represent Rollins College but also the country of Malta (the country to which they were assigned.)

Harvard's conference, which was held at Boston's Park Plaza Hotel, featured over 3,000 college students from all over the world including Venezuela, China, and the Netherlands.

Each individual participant was assigned to a specific "committee" in which they acted as a delegate to the country which their college was assigned. In these 3-5 hour committee meetings, delegates collaborated, contested, and compromised with other delegates as they worked to establish a resolution to the "international problems" that were presented to them.

Besides the perpetual committee meetings, conference participants were also treated to other various activities, including: a club night at one of Boston's hottest club, bus tours throughout the city, a late-night cocktail party, and a delegate dance. Needless to say, there were plenty of activities in which the students could participate.

At the end of the threeday conference, an awards ceremony was held for all of the UN teams. Although Rollins' students didn't take home any awards this year, the experience has only proved to inspire them to work harder and perform better at next year's Harvard National Model UN.

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