Concordia International School Shanghai MUN XI
Seven Grade 10 Binus Simprug students (Nadya, Tubagus Annet, Nichelle, Artaya, AK, and Bertram) from batch 2020 flew to China on 16 January 2020 to participate the CISSMUN 11th annual conference representing the country, Colombia. During the first day of the conference, Friday, 17 January 2020, the participants arrived at the venue (Concordia International School Shanghai) at approximately 10:00 AM on time for the registration and opening ceremony.
The opening ceremony itself was very interesting as there were over 1,098 delegates from around the world (e.g. USA, Iran, Korea, Australia) participating the Model United Nations. Furthermore, the Concordia International School Shanghai headmaster’s speech regarding current worldwide events along with certain expectations was humorous yet insightful since he incorporated jokes and made sarcastic remarks regarding controversial political and country choices. After the opening ceremony, all participants were directed to their respective committees and they commenced the group activity with introduction, roll call, and opening speeches.
I was a part of the 3rd committee: the social, humanitarian, and cultural committee (ECOSOC) which discussed existing health, religious, political, safety, and environmental issues. The strength of the committee was that it was non-binding, meaning that any resolution crafted cannot be progressed as a law. Therefore, extensive negotiation and communication needed to be done to ensure the feasibility of each solution. Prior to the opening speech, I got acquainted with the other delegates residing in my table. As there were four delegates (Delegates’ seating arrangement is based on the country they are representing.), I had the privilege of befriending the delegates of Côte d’Ivoire, Croatia, and China. They were all friendly and generally very pleasant people. During the opening speech, all delegates commenced their respective speeches with a statistic hook and ended with concerned problems at hand. However, I decided to use a more emotional hook in order to stand out and make my speech more appealing. The hook itself acted as a catalyst for both the chair and other delegates to be more interested and engaged in listening to my entire speech instead of zoning it out. Thankfully the strategy worked as I held the attention of the whole council and managed to get a handful of notes from other delegates expressing their interest in collaborating with me during the lobbying phase. Moreover, I found out that the speech itself could either be about just one topic, a merge of two topics, or all four at once. As long as the delegate presents his or her stances and possible solutions regarding the matter at hand, the speech will hold the attention of other delegates and increase their eligibility.
Within the duration of the conference, I realized the significance of passing notes and expressing my intent in collaborating and discussing the matter with other delegates of similar stances. Passing notes gave an edge to recruit as well as work with proficient and experienced delegates who inevitably increased the success rate of the draft resolution.
Although there were four topics to explore, I decided to focus on the one that I was most confident of which is “Guaranteeing the health, safety, and security of religious pilgrims during the Hajj and other religious-cultural pilgrimages and festivals”. During the lobbying phase, I formed a block with five other delegates and we worked and created a draft resolution. It turned out, all of the debates in session will focus on ensuring the feasibility of the draft resolution submitted by each block. In addition, no sessions regarding root causes of the issue were raised; it was all purely just debate over the six draft resolutions submitted. Most motions were either raised against or for the draft resolution, with additional time for point of inquiries.
On January 18th and 19th, I managed to have a good number of friends. I also successfully became a main co-submitter of my draft resolutions even though my assigned country has no significant stance on the matter itself. As regards speeches, it is an advantage for the delegates to do research beforehand about precedents associated with the problems as well as the laws and policies regulated in certain countries. These facts will be important as they serve as evidences whenever the delegate intends to conduct a speech promoting or demoting a certain draft resolution. Seemingly, most delegates do not conduct extensive research beforehand, which proved as a weakness as their solutions were often had precedents. In respect with my involvement, I made many points of inquiries to bring down certain delegates. One of the hardest factors of the draft resolution was finding some financial funding since other delegates were more likely to look for flaws relating to what subsidies are needed and how they are provided.
Although there were no awards and we only had fun superlatives, the conference was a very good experience. The organizers as well as the principal of the school believed that the spirit of the conference is to primarily promote collaboration and teamwork to build life-lasting connections. They further claimed that awards spark jealousy and rivalry between the delegates, giving the MUN a hostile and unfriendly atmosphere based on their experiences and feedback in hosting the event. Thus, CISSMUN is good international exposure for new MUN delegates since no awards are present and the event has an amicable, cooperative, and encouraging environment that promotes collaboration and growth.
Despite the fact that the MUN conducted in the CISSMUN was very much different (no awards such as best delegates, best position paper) from the ones commonly conducted in Jakarta, Indonesia, it allowed me to broaden my knowledge and skills in creating a sound resolution, debate, and negotiation skills. That being said, I highly recommend to the future delegates to prepare a well-crafted draft resolution before attending the MUN. In addition, certain committees won’t allow to use technology when in session, thus, print out relevant documents and researches beforehand. Proactively take an initiative in opening discussions since it draws the attention of other delegates to listen to you. Deliver a strong and meaningful stance and make your presence felt in the group. These attitudes develop self-confidence, positive audience impact and respect that ultimately bring out the organic flow of sound thoughts to convince people about one’s stance leading to a sound resolution to solve issues. After all, we discuss, collaborate and socialize to make a healthy and harmonious solution for the betterment of the world.
