Daniel Konstantinovic
Tomorrow, May 22nd, will mark the start of New Canaan High School’s annual Model United Nations Sophomore Simulation, a yearly event run by the school’s Model United Nations club in which all sophomores participate in a day-long simulation of a Model United Nations Conference. The event serves as an opportunity for Sophomores to work towards solutions for real-world problems, as well as solve historical issues from a modern-day context.
The simulation’s opening ceremonies will begin at 7:30 am during which Yale professor Jean Krasno will give a keynote speech. Students will then proceed from the Wagner Room to their respective debate rooms.
Five rooms will be run during the simulation, each one tackling different topics and requiring a different set of skills. The first room, DISEC (Disarmament and International Security Committee), will be the largest of the four rooms with approximately 80 delegates. Sophomores in this room will be discussing the issues of foreign military intervention and cyber warfare. The room will be chaired by Junior club members Charlie Sosnick, Casey Clifford, Jake Morris, and Deven Appel.
The first of the two mid-size rooms, the OAS (Organization of American States), will cover the Colombian crisis and the issue of drug control in the Americas. The room will be chaired by Junior club members Katie Means, Jayne Wixtead, Kyla Persky, and Matthew DeMattia. The second mid-size room, the IAEA (International Atomic Energy Agency) will cover the issues of Iran’s nuclear program and the disposal of nuclear waste. The room will be chaired by Junior club members Jimmy Dolphin, Elias Litchman, Veronica Ma, and Alex Russell.
The last two rooms will be the crisis committees and thus the smallest rooms at the simulation, the first being NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization) covering the topic of the Ukraine crisis. The chairs will be Junior club members Shaan Appel, Erin Bucci, Casey Manzella, and JP McMahon. The second crisis committee is a historical crisis which will recreate the March Russian Revolution of 1917. The room will be chaired by Junior club members Ann B, Michael Popper, and Steven Singer.
All sophomore not in one of the five debate rooms will participate in the Press Corps, run by senior Co-captain Daniel Konstantinovic, senior Naomi Newman, freshman Brooks Rosenberg, and Faculty Advisor Michelle Luhtala. Students in the Press Corps will use social media to cover the events in the five debate rooms from the points of view of various news publications like Fox News, The New York Times, and the Onion.
After debate ends for the day, closing ceremonies will be held in the Wagner Room during which each of the chairs will present the awards to the respective winners in their rooms.
Watch the events of the Sophomore Simulation unfold on twitter using the hashtag #SophSim.
