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九十四年度高中職社區化「模擬聯合國」活動介紹
王鳳真老師
壹、 前言
「高中生模擬聯合國」(High School Model United Nations)
5 0年前開始於歐美國家，至今已發展成為風靡世界的學生活動。所謂模擬聯合國，顧名思義就是模仿聯合國某一機構的運作方式和議事規則，針對聯合國所關注的某一熱點問題所召開的國際會議。
本校於九十四年度獲教育部補助，執行高中職社區化英文科創意教學特色發展專案計劃，特地為新竹市高中生設計這一項活動，希望學生有機會參與練習國際性會議的機會。本計畫有國立新竹女中、國立新竹高中、國立新竹高商、市立建功高中暨本校等五校共同參與。
貳、活動目標
1. 使學生學習及熟悉國際性議題，例如飢荒與糧食問題、環保等等相關議題。
2. 培養學生辯論及談判等溝通技巧、國際事件之處理技巧、翻譯等能力。
3. 使學生有機會與外國學生作跨文化及外交禮儀及事務等方面之經驗交流。
4. 使學生熟悉聯合國的實際運作模式。
參、活動內容與進行方式
在本次專案計畫中，本校從九月初到十二月中，一共舉行五次會議，來完成這項專案。
參與這一活動的一般都是在校的高中學生，他們組成“代表”國家的“政府代表團”，就某一特定的議題進行闡明立場、展開辯論、進行遊說、開展談判、起草文件，最後通過決議等等活動。
一、94.09.07 Hsin-Chu City High School MUN 第一次集會邀集新竹市高中職社區化特色專案學校與會，說明模擬聯合國(Model United Nations)活動之目的 及內容，並擬訂執行目標。
二、94.09.21邀請臺中美國學校校長Mr. Irvin Stein 介紹模擬聯合國活動 。Mr. Irvin Stein 對MUN
非常熟悉，曾經撰寫在荷蘭海牙國際模擬聯合國活動的活動手冊。本校特地邀請他來為參與活動的教師們做培訓的工作。
三、94.10.20由台中美國學校協助辦理『九十四年度新竹市區高中職社區化英文創意教學特色專案—模擬聯合國種子教師與學生訓練會議』
四、94.12.03新竹市區MUN模擬聯合國會前會
本校在十二月三日舉辦模擬聯合國會前會，希望各國代表正式與會前，能熟悉整個會議運作模式。
五、94.12.10新竹市區MUN模擬聯合國會議正式會議開場，這次模擬聯合國活動只有一個委員會，就是環境委員會，共有三十四個國家參與。在簡短歡迎儀
式後，各國代表先發表開場演說OPENING
SPEECH，表明各國的環保政策及立場。接著進行遊說討論LOBBYING,
下午開始修正案辯論及表決，各國代表唇槍舌劍，你來我往，最後到五點鐘，主席敲下最後一槌，雙方才在意猶未盡中散會，相約明年再見。
肆、結語
1.本次新竹市模擬聯合國活動，係第一次舉辦，共有國立新竹女中、國立新竹高商、市立建功高中暨本校等四校共二十八位同學擔任國家代表，另外加上各校指導老師、會議工作同學、行政老師們，實際參加的人員共有六十五位，可以說是一次盛大的活動。
2.所有參加的國家代表同學們，事先均花了許多心力、時間準備，這也使得整個會議的進行非常流暢，讓在座的外籍老師們也對同學們的表現刮目相看。在會議結束時，許多參與者均表示收穫良多。
3.模擬聯合國活動第一次在新竹市舉辦，原先有些學校仍採取觀望態度，希望有了第一次經驗後，下次能有更多學校參與。
4. 本校已將活動全程錄影，將製作成光碟片分送各社區化學校參考。
5.在舉辦的時間上，有老師們建議，改在週間舉行，這一點主辦學校將再徵求與會學校意見，以備下次會議參考。
HSINMUN:
THE FIRST MODEL UNITED NATIONS
AMONG HSINCHU HIGH SCHOOLS
By Ms. Marjorie King
 On Saturday, December 10, the National
Experimental High School initiated and hosted the first Model
United Nations meeting among four Hsinchu high schools. Addressing
the delegates, teachers, and support staff, Principal Wu Rong-feng
congratulated the group for taking its place among 2600 other high
school students and teachers worldwide who meet yearly in Model
United Nations. He called the local meeting of HSINMUN a
“history-making event” and expressed his hope for annual
conferences.
Thirty delegates and their teachers from the Hsinchu Girls High
School, Commercial High School, and Chien Gung High School joined
the Experimental and Bilingual Departments of NEHS to simulate
member nations on an environmental committee. The day’s goal was
to pass a resolution on global warming. The urgency and timeliness
of the issue was highlighted by the concurrent United Nations
Climate Change Conference in Montreal.
A few months’ preparation and several workshops ensured HSINMUN’s
success. We were very fortunate to have Mr. Irwin Stein, Principal
of the Taichung American School, as a resource. Mr. Stein has
worked with MUN for many years and co-authored The Hague
International Model United Nations’ Instructional Guide. In
mid-October 2005, all the HSINMUN delegates and teachers traveled
to the Taichung American School for a seminar with Principal
Stein. Since then, the delegates met weekly in their respective
schools to research their country positions on the issue of global
warming and to practice United Nations protocols.
Since HSINMUN was funded by a Taiwan government grant for creative
English teaching, all speeches and debates were conducted in
English. (Chinese was allowed in lobbying sessions.) Students
showed an impressive command of English, thanks to the commitment
of their English teachers. The teachers incorporated United
Nations topics and formal rules of parliamentary procedure into
their quarterly class curriculum and spent hours helping their
students rehearse their speeches.
The job of the Bilingual Department’s teachers was much easier.
The three faculty sponsors--Janice Rossing, Barbra Levine, and
Marjorie King—worked with students whose English ability was at
least as good as their Chinese! As all participants were new to
the Model United Nations process, the teacher-supervisors leaned
heavily for advise on Keith Eckerling and the experienced MUN
students. Ms. Nancy Wang and other Bilingual Department staff did
the lion’s share of the conference’s work.
All of the schools’ delegates met once before the official HSINMUN
conference. On December 3, they gathered at NEHS and met the
conference’s co-chairs, Tiffany Kuo and Katie Chang, students of
the Bilingual Department of NEHS. The co-chairs reviewed the rules
and procedures and led a practice lobbying session. Delegates
began the critical task of building political alliances.
The big day finally arrived. Dean Christine Huang joined Principal
Wu in welcoming the delegates to NEHS. She stressed the underlying
goal of the MUN experience as one of developing a global point of
view. Katie and Tiffany, masterfully led the conference and gently
instructed delegates on substance and form. We were very fortunate
to have such knowledgeable, articulate, and poised co-chairs.
As the day progressed, the students gradually overcame their
shyness and tried out new lobbying, writing and speaking skills.
Intense and focused negotiations continued throughout the morning.
The delegates’ task was to find allies with whom to merge
selective clauses from their individual resolutions, and reach
common solutions to the problem of greenhouse gas emissions.
Delegates remained faithful to their countries’ positions, while
trying hard to hammer out an agreement. Finally, by the end of the
lunch break, two resolutions emerged.
Throughout the afternoon, delegates debated each resolution in
turn. But the solution to global warming proved no easier as a
simulation than it is in the real United Nations. Neither
resolution passed easily. By 4:30, both had been rejected on the
first ballots. The co-chairs urged delegates to rethink their
positions in order to pass one of the resolutions. After a coffee
break, a revote was taken. By just two votes, one of the
resolutions finally passed.
We were all tired but exhilarated. We had worked hard, learned
much, made new friends and gained greater respect for the United
Nations. As we walked out, talk of next year’s issues had already
begun.
The Hague International Model United Nations
-The Singapore Experience
Calvin Liou, 11A
When I found out I was accepted for MUN-Singapore, I felt like a
soldier standing at the crossroads of an impending battle. I was
faced with the task of drafting a resolution and getting it passed
in a committee filled with elite students from the top institutes
in Asia. It was The Hague International Model United Nations, more
commonly referred to as THIMUN-Singapore.
Luckily, I was assigned the country of South Korea, and this was
definitely beneficial in my forum. As a delegate of the Economic
and Financial Subcommittee of the 2nd General Assembly (GA 2,) I
not only had a solid foundation in Economics (thanks to Mr. Karch
and his AP Economics course) and a passion for finance and
business (fueled by the Businessweek magazines that my dad leaves
in the bathroom,) but also a well-developed country with a voice
of authority in the international arena.
With the right country and the right background, I now wondered if
I was adept as a delegate. I was scared of the great task ahead of
me, so I pursued a thorough working schedule. Under Mr.
Eckerling’s careful guidance and the help of my friends, I
formulated a policy statement and a decent resolution. I was
ready.
The day before MUN, I was having last minute jitters. I remember
my English teacher, Ms. Kay, saying “You’ll do great. I’m sure
that you’re going to surprise yourself. Just be yourself.”
Although I lied to her when I told her that I believed her, I
started wondering if I could surprise myself at Singapore. Should
I just...be myself? Probably not.
The first day of MUN was a day of lobbying and merging
resolutions. At the conference, there was a group of General
Assembly members sitting idly at a picnic table in the lobbying
area. Everybody looked scared. Seeing that nobody was moving, I
pulled out my notebook computer and quickly presented the
resolution to my fellow delegates. Many of them liked it, and
before I knew it, there were many people crowded around my
notebook.
The group of us merged our resolutions, and the twenty one
submitters voted me as main submitter. As their main submitter, I
had to give a speech and read our resolution to the group. The
next day, I delivered a speech on behalf of South Korea. Delegates
who lived in South Korea came up to me after adjournment and
thanked me for representing the spirit of their country.
The resolution passed after two hours of intense debate, and the
majority of the committee voted for the resolution. I sank back in
my seat, feeling elated. Later in the conference, my fellow
delegates voted me as the “most diplomatic delegate,” and I was
again honored. For me, the conference was a success! In
retrospect, I had gone to Singapore to do exactly what I had
intended to do. I had been true to Ms. Kay’s words—I had simply
been myself.
Falling in Love with ECOSOC at THIMUN-Singapore
Katie Chang, 11B
My love affair with ECOSOC (the Economic and Social Forum) began
in quite the clich? fashion—one glimpse at the six issues at hand
and I was rapt. If you’ve seen Lady and the Tramp, you should have
some idea of the feelings that overwhelmed and consumed me from
June to November.
It is with these emotions that I, along with Alice Wu, began to
pursue ECOSOC passionately. Multiple dates at Starbucks led to
what I am confident was the first ever MUN sleepover, a night
devoted to all things ECOSOC. I whirled myself through a dizzying
kaleidoscope of emotions: excitement, anxiety, elation, despair...
page after page, site after site, each new reference tugged my
heartstrings down a foreign road, right up to the Theater of
Hwachong Institution, Singapore. And then the gavel slammed down.
Lobbying was simply awe-inspiring. I didn’t know what to expect, I
didn’t have time to react, and when it was over, I couldn’t
believe it had ended. Teetering on painful heels, Alice and I
split up and tackled debate after debate, trying fervently to
assuage the concerns of each country while still holding true to
ours, South Korea. Four hours of intense deliberation and two
submitted resolutions later, I rested, spent, and created speaking
plans with the veteran boys from International School of Beijing (ISB)
while joking about the 2-in-1 shampoo-soap so luxuriously provided
by the Copthorne Orchid Hotel.
Occasional pressure, frustration, and angst were nothing compared
to the euphoria that radiated from each delegate in the midst of a
great debate. And great debates they were. With eight resolutions
and only two and a half days, time was crucial. The perfect word,
the perfect phrase, the perfect speech…perfection is often
elusive, but we sought after it anyway. Glory moments still haunt
me today—I will never forget the exaltation charging through me as
I gave the decisive speech that eased a near unanimous passing of
our resolution. Afterwards, delegates approached us, asking if we
were really from South Korea, because we had represented it to
par. To quote Mark Twain, a person can live for two months on a
good compliment. It’s true, I’ve done it.
There is something to be said about MUN that I cannot quite
pinpoint, for in those three days of conference, the microcosm
world that we cared so much about truly became a better place.
That was the beauty of partaking in ECOSOC, a committee dearly
known as the idealistic facet of the UN. We had made an ephemeral
contribution that could never be replicated, but surely existed in
those fleeting moments.
“THINGAPORE”: The Press Experience
Teresa Lii, 12B
So here I am, a press member, writing about being press for
another paper. Ironic, isn’t it? Technically I’m breaking all the
rules by using an informal tone and referring to myself in the
first person. Incidentally, those are the exact same rules you
need to know when you apply to become a member of a Model United
Nations (MUN) newspaper.
Before the conference actually takes place, being a delegate
already involves large amount of preparation, while acting as
press is fairly painless. The four NEHS press delegates to THIMUN-Singapore’s
inaugural conference (Irene Strychalski, Audrey Lan, Rune-Wen
Huang and myself) were assigned pieces a few months before with
extended deadlines. Simple enough; we completed our articles (or
drawings, in Irene’s case) and emailed them to the
editors-in-chief of THIMUN-Singapore’s paper, MUNITY-East.
But wait – that was before the conference. THIMUN-Singapore itself
was a totally different story. Every morning, press delegates
dragged themselves out of bed earlier than others to sell the
papers they’d put together the previous day. Yes, sell; between
8:00 and 8:45 AM, we, dressed in the characteristic pink shirt of
the press, stood outside the main building and offered the paper
to various incoming delegates and MUN advisors. Obviously, some
were more willing to pull out the necessary two Singaporean
dollars than others.
Afterwards, we rushed back to the press room to receive the day’s
assignments. Articles covered everything from the daily events in
each committee, the dinner-dance on the last night of the
conference to real-world issues such as global warming. Being
Press was grueling work: often, after running crazily around the
conference looking for people to interview, female press members
would walk around the press room barefoot, their painful
high-heeled shoes in piles on the ground. Each piece was to be
written under specific time constraints (often less than two hours
per article), and a layered editing process examined each item
carefully before passing it for layout. Word counts and stylistic
techniques were strictly implemented, and the workload was doubled
for those lucky enough to receive two or more assignments a day.
In between the deadlines, sometimes we did have the luxury to sit
back and enjoy leisure time; but more often we were busy at our
computers, typing up revision after revision. However, at the end
of each day, the result was always a colorful, diverse paper
exploding with news, information, brilliant cartooning, and lively
candid shots. Editorials provided room for personal expression,
and even hard-news stories could contain dry wit. There was always
a tangible result to be proud of.
So which do I recommend, applying for press or delegate? As
always, the answer depends on you. But if you love to write, then
press is definitely your choice. It’s all worth it.
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