Model UN awarded at conference

By Cindy Dinh     3/20/08 7:00pm

With world affairs debated in the media daily, Rice students have the opportunity to engage in political current events by walking in the shoes of an international delegate. Last weekend, seven delegates from the Rice Model United Nations team competed in the University of California at Berkeley Model United Nations Conference held in San Francisco, Calif. and came home with awards such as Honorable Mention for Small Delegation.The collegiate chapter of Model UN emulates the United Nations in that student delegates are randomly assigned committees such as the Security Council or World Bank and represent the interests of their assigned country. Rice members represented Pakistan and Burkina Faso, and the delegates prepared by researching topics and writing position papers on how their assigned country would feel about certain issues. Some of the topics included Iran seeking nuclear weapons, non-state paramilitary organizations or women's human rights violations in Malaysia.

Baker College sophomore Lisandra Matos, who was on the Human Rights Committee, represented Pakistan's opinion on Baha'i, an Iranian religious minority group, and its inability to access to higher education.

"You have to follow the same attitude of the country you are representing," Matos said. "For instance, the delegate representing Venezuela denounced the United States and called it imperialistic."

---

---

Model UN President Michael Feldman, a Sid Richardson College sophomore, said the quality of the debate at these conferences was what attracted him the most.

"You have to be willing to put aside your personal feelings and take the position of the country," Feldman said.

Feldman said he argued against his personal beliefs when he represented the Pakistani perspective in the Disarmament and Security Committee and argued that Iran has the right to develop nuclear technology. Feldman achieved Honorable Mention in his committee while Jones College sophomore Cathy Yang received the distinction of Best Delegate in the Legal Committee.

Feldman said the team did well.

"I was pleasantly surprised with how well we did, especially going against hard-hitters like Columbia, University of Pennsylvania and University of Texas who send more delegates to these conferences," Feldman said.

The team is looking into expanding its size and attending more than one conference next year. As part of a fundraising effort for the conferences, Rice Model UN hosts an annual conference for area high school UN teams to debate and raise community awareness about issues in the UN.

Feldman said Rice Model UN differs from the clubs at other schools in the variety of students it attracts.

He said the team currently boasts an economics as well as an environmental science major.

"What makes Rice Model UN team unique from other teams is how we have members from a broad range of majors, whereas other schools have mostly international affairs majors," Feldman said. "We're looking for anyone who's highly motivated and is interested in debating international issues.

---