Taking a stand on the podium, Niles West’s Model UN proposes different ideas for varying issues. If you’re interested in discussing world issues and forming resolutions, Model UN is the club for you.

In meetings, co-presidents, seniors Almeera Mushtaq and Prisha Singh, lead the members through preparing for conferences by holding monthly mock conferences. 

“I personally love the mock conferences, mostly because I get to chair them and I get to play the role that usually I don’t get to do. Also, I think that the member’s personalities shine so much during mock conferences. We have delegates trying to be funny and we have delegates really just delivering amazing speeches, and that would definitely be my favorite part of Model UN,” Singh said. 

Mock conferences teach members about the ‘language’ of Model UN and the parliamentary procedures that conferences entail such as moderated caucuses and motions.

Members will act as delegates for their country and state their opinions on a topic in the interest of their country. In a meeting leading up to their conference at Carl Sandburg, they practiced moderated caucuses, which is the designated speaking time per speaker on a specific topic.

Model UN went to its first conference of the season at Carl Sandburg High School on Saturday, Oct. 15. The team left in high spirits because each delegate competed in their committee, with junior Noah Youkhana winning Outstanding and junior Fionn Riley winning Honorable Mention, which is the equivalent to second and third place. Mushtaq and Singh feel that the results of this first conference sign that the club is only going up from there. 

“Obviously I’m proud of getting to place second in my conference committee. I think just being there was kind of interesting, you expect everyone to be coming in knowing everything but there are also people who are struggling just as much as you and everyone is thinking the same thoughts as you are and everyone’s freaking out. Just being able to adapt to those freakouts the best and figure out what to do next is freaky,” Youkhana said. 

Conferences go as follows: Club members meet at school at seven a.m. and drive out to whatever school the conference will take place at. There is a welcome ceremony where they give a speech to prepare the delegates for the day and then each person is divided into their own conference that they have prepared for. Delegates prepare ideas on two different topics and begin debating as their country in their first moderated caucus. There is a lunch break and then delegates go back to their second moderated caucus where a resolution will be drafted. The conference ends with an awards ceremony.  

“I really do love the conferences, the bus rides there and waiting in the auditorium seats with your entire team, I think it really does just bring the club together a lot more than the meetings do. We’re all kind of trying to go towards this one goal and that’s to make the team proud and to make Niles West proud. I think that connection through team members is really fun,” Mushtaq said. 

Singh and Mushtaq have been members since freshman year and continued attending online meetings through COVID. Now they have been running the club for the past two years.

As Co-Secretary Generals, in Model UN terms, the bulk of their work was done last year by changing the club to fit their vision. Each week they plan out a slideshow that starts every meeting with an event of the week. This is a topic that leaders pick and members debate the topic. This helps them practice debating and being put on the spot in the conferences. Slideshows also contain a new skill to help prep for conferences. They create background guides on the topic of their mock conferences to help prepare members. They also figure out the logistics for conferences like signing up and figuring out how many seats are needed per conference as well as the committees they will sign up for. Leaders have also incorporated activities like Jeopardy and Kahoot to make sure the club is still fun. 

Model UN changed from a social setting with occasional conferences to the club that Singh and Mushtaq hoped it to be. The club’s attitude towards conferences has changed since the two have been leaders, having gone from people having the option to go to now members being excited to go because members have been successful. 

“We saw the potential of the club and we really wanted to turn it into something competitive but also not so stressful,” Singh said. 

“[One] thing I’m really proud of is our progression in the club itself. We started off as members, I think freshman year we never even went to conference, sophomore year we were kind of thrown into one. It was a very loosely managed club just because the president had a lot of other responsibilities. We really enjoyed our time sophomore year but we really saw this is something we are passionate about, how can we make this our own and take it further? So that’s what we did, we created lesson plans for students and guides. We do mock conferences, so every month or so we essentially have a simulation of the conferences we compete in, and these are all things Prisha and I did ourselves and we are really proud of the initiative we took to make the club look the way we wanted it to,” Mushtaq said. “It really went from a group of people who can go to a group of people who are excited to go and are motivated.”

Model UN is currently prepping for its next conference on Nov. 5, at St. Ignatius. There is still time to join the club. Contact sponsor Mr. Lee at [email protected] if you are interested.