This past Thursday and Friday, I, amongst other Oratory Prep students, attended a virtual yearly Model UN conference, AMUN XXII. With this being the second major conference that I have attended during my time at Oratory, I had started to feel a lot more confident in what I had to do and how the assembly generally worked, as what I have seen in this and the last conference is that the best way to become better and learn is through experience. Typically, conferences are held in compact areas depending on how large your committee is, but because of COVID regulations everything had become strictly virtual; but thanks to the use of breakout rooms as well as other accessories, we were able to make it worthwhile with a minimal amount of problems.

My delegation, the African Union, focused on major problems within the continent, like the exploitation of natural resources as well as the use of child soldiers, but there are a variety of topics that you can delve into depending on the committee that you choose. Preparation is key when going into these conferences because, while you could go in with no information and completely guess your country’s stance on certain issues, it is not beneficial to everyone else and it makes the assembly much more difficult, rather than going into it prepared and concurrently having a much better understanding and a better time. Usually during the unmoderated caucus, you would walk around to different delegates to discuss not only your stances, but your solutions to certain issues. Because we were virtual this year we would head into breakout rooms instead, which surprisingly was as, if not more, efficient than how it usually is.

Overall, what I expected to be a rocky experience because of the different nature of this year turned out to be a lot easier than I expected. Everyone was engaged and informed, and the atmosphere was very light and not as serious as people who have not been involved in Model UN usually think. Plus, it boosts your confidence when it comes to public speaking, as you are pushed to speak among the other delegates, especially in smaller committees. In the end, through the hard work of everyone who put the time into setting up this event, I, and from what I have heard many others, greatly enjoyed this conference, with a hope that next year we can go to in-person conferences with relative ease.