The Model United Nations: Building Understanding About Global Issues

Several years ago, I had the opportunity to go on a video shoot at the International School of the Americas (ISA) [1], in San Antonio, Texas. The ISA, a small high school on the grounds of the larger Robert E. Lee High School, was envisioned more than ten years ago by a group of Trinity University faculty and North East Independent School District staff, and based on a paper written by Thomas Sergiovanni, a professor of education at Trinity.

With a capacity of about 450 students selected by lottery, the school draws from more than twenty-five middle schools from the San Antonio area. There are no achievement-based criteria for admittance; all students need to demonstrate is a desire to be there.

At the time the school was opening, the North American Free Trade Agreement brought into focus the idea of international trade and global economics. Therefore, a key theme across curricular areas at the ISA is that of global awareness, international relations, and the opportunities and challenges for the United States in a growing global economy.

The opportunity to travel to foreign countries would offer students first-hand knowledge about other countries and cultures. The school's proximity to Mexico would allow students to take an extended field trip [2] during their sophomore year. Travel to other areas of Texas, the United States, and abroad would enable students to reflect on and question what it means to be a global citizen. (An extremely powerful trip is one that freshmen take to a Heifer International Learning Center [3], which provides a true hands-on and immersion experience about solutions to global hunger, poverty, and environmental degradation.)

The ISA's teachers are extremely adept at formulating learning experiences that push students to examine their own beliefs and contrast them with the opinions and beliefs of people in other countries. In this short video clip, you'll see students in the Model United Nations of San Antonio (MUNSA) [4] practicing for their Model United Nations conference. Each year, these students organize and run a student simulation of the United Nations, attracting more than 600 participants, including foreign students. The organization offers participants the opportunity to learn about global issues and international relations, as well as build their communication and interpersonal skills.

According to teacher and MUNSA program coordinator Russell Rowton:

"Students participating in the Model United Nations are able to learn how to walk in the shoes of someone besides themselves. They get to get outside of their own habits and their own ways of thinking and really understand what different cultural and political viewpoints mean. Whether they come to agree with them or not, they understand that there are a multitude of viewpoints and they understand why those different viewpoints exist."

"The Model United Nations requires intensive academic research, so kids really get to hone their research skills," Rowton adds. "A number of things need to get written for the Model United Nations experience, and it really helps kids to hone that their writing skills, and, third, there are important interpersonal skills. Kids really have to learn how to work with each other in a diplomatic fashion. That does not come naturally to the teenager, so having to do that is a big piece."

"We have the goal that our students will exit our school with an idea of how to really present themselves in a professional fashion," he says, "and the Model United Nations is another one of those big pieces that helps them obtain that professional air about themselves."

Just a few years after starting their Model United Nations conference, the ISA students began an ongoing relationship with the City of San Antonio's International Affairs Department, which now makes the conference an official city-sponsored event. The city government provides access to San Antonio's conference facility and a budget for catering and other expenses.

Coming on Monday, more about how the ISA weaves global awareness into its curriculum. Stay tuned.