Dexter Middle Schoolers Attend First Time Model UN Event

Students from Mill Creek Middle School had a great experience this last month when they participated as Model United Nations delegates at the Great Lakes Invitational Middle School Conference. This was a first for this conference and it ended up being a great learning experience.

To learn more, the Sun Times News connected with the team and Co-Advisor Jaime Dudash, the high school advisor and who serves as co-advisor along with Dexter teacher Steve Wincent. The conference was hosted by the Great Lakes Invitational Conference Association, which is one of the largest Model United Nations Programs in the state, Dudash said. With over 12 schools represented, the conference had nearly 100 middle schoolers in attendance and was held at The Roeper Middle and Upper School in Birmingham.

The Great Lakes Invitational Conference Association typically hosts multiple conferences each year for high school Model UN participants, but this was their first time hosting a conference for middle level learners.

The Mill Creek students who attended the preparation and/or conference were:  Dominic Schoenerr, Josie Perry, Alexander Watkinson, Jacob Stevenson, Lauren Dudash and Devin Scheller.

The Model UN, as described by the Great Lakes Invitational Conference Association, “is, simply, a simulation of the United Nations. Participants (known as “delegates”) are assigned a country in a particular committee of the United Nations, and tasked with addressing a set of agenda topics with their fellow delegates as, and according to the policies of, their respective countries. The object of the exercise is to debate topics of global importance, from the perspective of people who are widely geographically separated, and come to an agreement as to how best to address the issues of the day while accommodating the viewpoints of everyone in the room. These “resolutions” are then presented in writing to the entire committee to be adopted, or rejected, by a general vote.”

At the Birmingham conference, the Mill Creek delegates were challenged with the political topic of debate of “Resource Extraction.” Dudash said the Mill Creek delegates were lucky to represent two internationally powerful nations in this space: Venezuela and Saudi Arabia. 

“This was particularly fascinating as our students were representing two of the most important ‘petro-states’ in the world,” Dudash explained of how the students felt about this challenge.

In preparation of the conference, for four successive weeks, Dudash said Mill Creek’s delegates “learned how to: conduct deep inquiry on a nation’s political history and connection to the topic, effectively utilize Parliamentary Procedure, as well as how to craft a position paper, and drafting resolutions, among many other nuances of the role of a Model United Nations delegate.” 

Dudash gave a special thank you to veteran high school Model UN students, senior Hanna Olson and junior Luke Dudash, for volunteering their time to provide instruction for the Dreadnaught Delegation.

 “This was a terrific experience for our middle level learners and many were able to hold their own with other delegates from other middle schools.  Much of the debate and conversation requires the learner to become an expert on the topic, then learn how to negotiate, deal-make, convince, and build coalitions among many differently minded nations to pass a resolution within their committee that will project substantive change and improvement in the international community,” Dudash said.  “It was tremendous for Mr. Wincent to offer up his time to help create a space for these internationally minded global thinkers to take a leap and give Model UN a whirl. We are hoping to offer more opportunities for learners next year.” 

Of the experience, Mill Creek student and conference delegate Alexander Watkinson said, “My best experience was just being able to debate with people, each of us wanting something and just that struggle of who concedes what to come to a compromise, so I enjoyed just being able to use the info I learned about my country and got to try my best to represent it.”

Photo 1: Team photo, From Left:  Co-Advisor:  Mr. Steven Wincent, Jacob Stevenson, Alexander Watkinson, Dominic Schoenerr, Lauren Dudash, Josie Perry and Co-Advisor:  Mr. Jaime Dudash

Photo 2: Co-Advisor Mr. Steven Wincent quietly looks on as Venezuelan Delegate Jacob Stevenson considers a speaker’s address.

Photos courtesy of Dexter Community Schools