On Saturday November 11th, 2017, RCC Model UN hosted its first Practice Academic Conference for Model UN (PACMUN for short). It brought together 85 students from 4 colleges and 4 high schools across southern California.

At the conference, the high school and college students worked in two committees: the high school students discussed The Protection of the Environment in Areas Affected by Armed Conflict in the UN Environmental Assembly (UNEA) committee; and the college students discussed Minimizing the Negative Impacts of Globalization in the UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) committee.

 

The conference opened with remarks from advisor Dr. Dariush Haghighat, and featured several keynote speakers, including: RCC President Wolde-Ab Isaac, and RCC Board of Trustee Member Janet Green.

The RCCMUN team represented various countries in the UNCTAD committee, including the United States, China, Japan, Italy, and Malaysia. In addition, four RCCMUN students chaired the two committees: Jasmin Brown and Gamaliel Perez in UNEA, and Rachel Lennox and Tony Ramons in UNCTAD.

In the committes, students gave speeches on important aspects of the topics, and formed groups to create solutions in the form of working papers. After several rounds of submitting their working papers to the committee chairs, they were accepted as draft resolutions and voted on by the committee. The UNEA committee adopted 2 draft resolutions, which addressed monitoring areas affected by armed conflict and providing aid to countries affected by armed conflict. The UNCTAD committee adopted 3 draft resolutions, which discussed expanding UNCTAD’s technical assistance program, improving fair trade policies, and trade regulations to protect the environment.

At the closing of the conference, students heard from another RCCMUN student, Gamaliel Perez, and from Norco Community College President Bryan Reece. Several awards were also presented to 3 countries in each committee, selected by the Chairs (in the categories of Outstanding, Distinguished, and Honorable Mention), and 3 selected by their peers (Outstanding Delegate in Committee). In UNCTAD, Palestine received the Outstanding Delegate Award, USA received the Distinguished Delegate Award, and Togo the Honorable Mention Delegate Award. In UNEA, India received the Outstanding Delegate Award, Poland the Distinguished Delegate Award, and China the Honorable Mention Delegate Award.

RCCMUN student Skylar Fisher, representing the United States, received the Oustanding Delegate in Committee Award and the Distinguished Delegate Award. Overall, the RCCMUN team did well at the conference, participating in writing working papers, working with many students, and even learning to Chair more effectively. The conference served as great preparation for the 12 students who were selected to attend the National Model United Nations conference in Banff, Canada.

All of us here at RCCMUN look forward to the next conference we will be hosting in February, our annual IECMUN conference. You can find more information about IECMUN at our website.