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The first MUN at Harrow Hong Kong

In January, 55 students participated in HARMUN – Harrow’s first Model United Nations conference. The conference was a great success, with detailed and well-presented debate ranging from topics such as ‘ending the production and use of biological and chemical weapons’ to fictional crises such as a proxy war between the USA and China. All the Harrow delegates performed impressively, but particular mention should be made of the student-led Secretariat of Ralph Summers and Akira Williams Rao (both Y13 Churchill), Andrew Crossan and David Stevenson (Y12 and Y13 Sun, respectively) who organised and managed the event. Also worthy of mention are the committee chairs, Joelle Chan (Y11, Gelhorn), James Brammer (Y12, Peel), Samar Jayachandran (Y12, Churchill) and Andrew Crossan (Y12, Sun), as well as the conference’s excellent administrative team.  Finally, congratulations go to Steven Liu (Y10, Peel) and Riaz Murray (Y11, Peel) who won ‘most improved delegate’ awards, and to Finn Bartlett (Y12, Sun) who won the best delegate award in his committee.

Andrew Crossan (Y12. Sun) has written an account for the event:

The European Union’s refugee crisis, conflict resolution in the Middle East, sanctions imposed upon Russia, peace deals and tension in the South China Sea. No, it was not an average day watching BBC World News – it was an extraordinary day in the life of a Model United Nations (MUN) delegate.

MUN involves students getting together, representing countries and debating real-world issues in the format of United Nations committees. It is relevant, challenging and engaging, and promotes dialogue about the difficulties our world faces, bringing people from all corners of the globe together – this takes students who participate in MUN one step closer to becoming true global citizens.

Our school motto Leadership for a Better World, is exactly what MUN seeks to promote, and Harrow’s inaugural MUN conference, HARMUN, saw the School’s leadership attributes in impressive action.

The 2016/17 Secretariat for the first time set out to host their very own MUN conference at Harrow International School Hong Kong. The conference ran over two days with over 50 delegates from 4 different schools around Hong Kong taking part. There were a variety of committees for delegates to choose from, such as Security Council, Disarmament and International Security, European Council and Crisis Cabinet. They all offered a wide variety of topics, and debate ranged from permanently ending the production and use of biological and chemical weapons to managing the flow of migrants into the European Union.

Crisis Cabinet is unique to HARMUN, and had never been tested prior to the conference. The Secretariat created it with the aim to keep debate interesting and relevant, through developments at regular intervals to the current topic being debated, allowing for a more engaging and interesting discussion. It gave way to an active and dynamic debate unlike any other committee, due to its smaller size and high-quality delegations.

MUN at Harrow is lead by the students and for the students, and HARMUN was no exception. It was a very successful event, all of which was student lead and organised. The secretariat team is looking forward to expanding and improving the conference year on year as MUN grows both in the school, as well as Hong Kong.

So, if you enjoy meeting new people, love the challenge of a good debate, want to broaden your horizons and hone those public speaking and decision-making skills, MUN is a great vehicle to do so! The world needs you.

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