SCAS Interact Club members Jack Nethery, Harry Webb, Shrutika Mane and Imran Rashid attended the Model United Nations Assembly (MUNA) at Kempsey High School. Representing Somalia and Turkey, the students, who were sponsored by Sunrise Rotary Club, were among 33 teams who participated in this annual Rotary district event.
The purpose of MUNA is to encourage young people to learn about other nations and to understand and appreciate the workings of the United Nations (UN) while they develop debating skills and gain self-confidence in public speaking. The resolutions to be debated are based on some that are actually debated by the UN as well as others proposed by the teams. The debates reproduce genuine UN debates often with a fine flow of rhetoric, points of order, motions of dissent and bloc walkouts!
Among the motions for debate this year were that the assembly ‘encourage all nations to develop infrastructure to promote the use of bicycles as a serious method of reducing the use of fossil fuels,’ ‘establish a committee to determine a set of international standards to control the moral content of material on the internet and access to that material,’ and ‘establish a co-ordinating body to combine all research needed to establish a human colony on Mars.” While the motions were debated behind the scenes the MUNA countries bribed and made alliances with other countries and MUNA staff to enable them to plot against their rivals and to intercept important intelligence.
The teams had an educational, fun and fulfilling weekend and would recommend the experience to all future Interact Club members.
