2022 Montessori Model United Nations Experience

My name is Seoni, I am a 5th grader. My delegation got voted by my committee to speak as the closing bureau for Upper Elementary Economical and Social Council (UE ECOSOC) during the closing ceremony at Montessori Model United Nations (MMUN). This was a really big deal for my delegation and school because I spoke in front of about 500 kids from North and South America! 

MMUN is super similar to the real United Nations (UN) and teaches students the international work of delegations. Montessori students from around the world attend conferences and workshops both in real life and online throughout the year.  We got to attend Committee sessions. Committee sessions are where your committee’s delegates read their speeches and work together to create a resolution around the topic, including all of their ideas. This is published on the MMUN website and sent to the real UN at the end of the conference. 

 

Wednesday

We arrived on Wednesday. That afternoon, we visited the Statue of Liberty and had fun dancing in the wind at the front of the boat. We climbed to the top of the pedestal. There were SO MANY stairs, but it was worth it for sure.  After getting some food and souvenirs, we were getting on to catch the boat, but we missed it! So we had to take the next ride. We were all so worried we would miss the flag ceremony. We finally got on the boat, and some of the students ate hotdogs for our classmate, Kiryl, who didn’t come on the trip.

When we got back to the hotel, the six flag-bearers quickly got dressed and ate. Then we had to wait in line for an hour! Finally, the line started to move, and we got to carry our flags. I was so excited!  I had never been to an in-person conference before, let alone carry the flag. Once we stepped into the ballroom, everyone in the crowd was screaming so loud to the music! I was literally shaking. Soon enough, it was over, and time to go to bed, but a few of our friends went to explore the city. We went to the M&M store, and it was so much fun!

 

Thursday 

Thursday and Friday were the two committee sessions. Each session was six hours each with a lunch break. In my committee ECOSOC, Thursday was Topic One: Youth Mental Health. My partner Nikolai and I walked in and found our placard; Hellenic Republic. First, we were introduced to all of the delegates. And then, we began presenting Youth Mental Health. Around half of the delegations read their speeches. Nikolai read his speech on this day because he was on Topic One. Out of the speeches, we made four basic subtopics and split them up into four groups, each group one subtopic.

After this, we had a two-hour lunch break. We went to this delicious street taco place, and then Henry got a GIANT hotdog and a pretzel after eating two tacos. Then we walked two more miles to the Broadway place and bought Wicked tickets, and finally, we went to The Disney Store. While we were walking back, we realized that we only had ten minutes to change and get back to the session. Once we came back, we started working on our preambulatory and operative clauses for our subtopics. Once we were done, we started merging, and there we have it, the Draft Resolution 1.1, which was passed by our committee. A little later after, everyone there walked to see Wicked. IT WAS AMAZING!!!!! After two hours, it was over. We exited the building, but it was raining SO HARD!!!! We ran and got soaking wet.

 

Friday

On Friday, we had a similar committee session for Topic Two (my topic), Leaving No One Behind. In this session, we were moving at a faster pace, so we were ahead of time. This time, we started writing some of our preambulatory and operative clauses before the two-hour break.

During this break, some of us went to Juniors (a restaurant across the street). We went to Juniors a couple of times.  We ate, then in secrecy (kind of), five of us left with Ms. Amelia to get KRISPY KREME!!! We brought it back to the hotel, stared out the window, and ate our KRISPY KREME. Soon enough, it was time to go back to the session.

We all finished the Draft resolution, and we’re now seeing the votes on who got elected for the closing Bureau. The closing Bureau is a team of 3 delegates for each of the topics, to explain what we did in our sessions. To my surprise, our country was elected to be a part of the closing bureau! Nikolai said I could do it, so I had to stay extra time to write my speech for the next day.

Emme, Arden, and Ms. Ruth had to wait for me, so we all walked back to the elevators. The elevators took FOREVER! We waited for about an hour. Finally, the elevator came. I made everyone who was going to Grand Central Station late. We walked to Grand Central Station and ate at a restaurant there. After that, we went ice skating in Rockefeller Center!!! Ice skating was SO fun, even though I didn’t know how to ice skate. My friend Mira helped me. We ended up ice skating for a lot longer than expected, so we rushed to the Celebration Night (back at the hotel). It was already about to end, but we didn’t care, so we jumped on the dance floor and joined the human train. While we were there, we danced and got to see Alexander Star perform. Soon, after the celebration night was over, a few of the girls were just hanging out in the hallway, but we got yelled at and went to bed. 

 

Saturday

The morning of Saturday, we were at the closing ceremony. The closing committee of ECOSOC was in line to present the work our committee did. Once we got on stage, I was the first on the committee to talk. My speech was about our resolutions that included Preamblautory and Operative Clauses, which were concerns and solutions. Our Operative Paragraphs included: Mental Health professionals at schools, Security monitors in schools, Public Government announcements on Youth Mental Health, and more. 

 

After the Closing Ceremony, it was a day to have fun. In the morning, we went back to Juniors for breakfast, then hopped on the subway to Chinatown. For lunch, we went to this delicious restaurant with dim sum. Ms. Amelia’s brother and sister-in-law came with us to help us order because she could speak Chinese. Everybody started spilling the pot of tea. I stole the last dumpling from Sanskriti, then she was mad, I started laughing. We were all full, but Ms. Amelia and I went to this really cool place and got mochi donuts for everyone! While we were doing that, everybody else got boba, and Kaya also got some for me. 

 

After we all finished eating, we went to an “I ❤️ NYC” shop. Most of us got sweatshirts and other souvenirs. Sadly, we were getting back on the subway to go back to the hotel. But instead of waiting at the hotel, a few of us went back to the M&M store! But sadly, we all forgot our jackets at the hotel. After the M&M store, we went to Havana Central (a Cuban restaurant). Everybody was wearing fancy attire except the people who went to the M&M store. They were wearing their I ❤️ NYC sweatshirts. Before we left, Ms. Rachel gave a teary-eyed speech because she was proud of us and that we could finally make it to New York.  The teachers gave us all MMUN bracelets and backpacks.

Once we left the restaurant, we went to The Metropolitan Museum Of Art (The Met). We walked to the bus stop, which was far away, and I was freezing because I forgot my coat. We were on the bus for about ten minutes, and then it was our stop. We spent a good amount of time at The Met, we walked through so many exhibits, but unfortunately, it was closing soon. We got so many souvenirs for our teachers at school. Ms. Amelia and Rachel tried calling taxis for the people whose parents didn’t come. Sanskriti, Kaya, Ms. Amelia, and I rode in a taxi. We reached the hotel safely but were really sad that we had to leave the next day.

 

Sunday

It was the last day of MMUN trip, we had to get ready early,

we rode in taxis to the airport, it was a good 30 minutes away. We checked our bags in and were climbing this really weird bench. We went to our gate, bought a few snacks, and Sanskriti bought a stuffed giraffe. We boarded the plane, then we reached home.

Please note, this was written by a fifth-grader, and consistent with Montessori principals and those of the Columbia Teachers Reading and Writing Project, this is true to her work, including writing style, language, punctuation, etc.