The fate of the world was in the hands of high school students at the Model United Nations Security Council Conference in the University Center on Thursday, Nov. 19, and Friday, Nov. 20.
This was the 20th year for the conference hosted by Cliff Staten, dean of the School of Social Sciences.
About 120 students from 13 regional high schools gathered to debate and propose resolutions to some critical U.N. security issues.
The students formed a mock U.N. Security Council by assuming roles as delegates for each country.
Mark Boone, social studies teacher at Crawford County Junior/Senior High School, said he has attended the conference for 11 years.
He said his students have been preparing for the debates since mid-September.
“Students learn how parliamentary procedure works,” Boone said. “They find out how complicated it can be to form resolutions and why they aren’t done very quickly.”
The conference was a two-day event.
It began Thursday evening in the Hoosier Room with introductions, followed by a showing of “Life in Occupied Palestine,” a video depicting the life of a Palestinian living in the West Bank.
The students then broke into eight security councils of about 30 students, with two students representing each country.
Eight IUS student chairs were placed with each council to help facilitate the debates.
Student chairs were volunteers and IUS Civil Liberty Union members.
Topics addressed by the Security Council delegates were Israeli settlements on the West Bank, nuclear weapons and Iran, nuclear weapons in North Korea, the U.S. embargo of Cuba and the Iraqi claim that Syria provides a safe haven for terrorists who could cross the border.
Stephen Sells, senior at Crawfordsville High School, was a delegate for Croatia in Security Council No. 2.
Sells said he called for the nuclear weapons and Iran as the first issue to be discussed in his council.
“I thought most delegates would come to a quicker resolution for that one,” Sells said.
Sells said he enjoys history and political science and has been preparing for the debates since September.
“I put others on edge,” Sells said. “I wanted to see how prepared they were.”
Thursday night debates lasted for an hour.
On Friday, the students met for brunch provided by IU Southeast in The Commons and toured the residential lodges before breaking into their respective security councils to debate resolutions. The students debated for five hours on Friday.
By LEAH TATE
Staff Writer
lmtate@ius.edu