Central Students Represent North Korea at Southeastern High School Model United Nations

CENTRAL REPRESENTS NORTH KOREA IN MODEL U.N. -- Preston Fore, Jake Johns, John Britt, and Matthew Frazier represent the North Korean delegation at annual SHSMUN.

Danielle Hooper

CENTRAL REPRESENTS NORTH KOREA IN MODEL U.N. — Preston Fore, Jake Johns, John Britt, and Matthew Frazier represent the North Korean delegation at annual SHSMUN.

Cassandra Castillo, Staff Writer
November 29, 2017

Four Central High School students participated in the annual Southeastern High School Model United Nations for the very first time this November.

The Southeastern High School Model United Nations, or SHSMUN for short, is a program where high school students select a nation of their choice and debate topics while creating resolutions. SHSMUN was held on November 18 through November 20 at the Chattanooga Convention Center

Preston Fore, a junior at Central, suggested that Central participate in this event. The students chose to represent the delegation of North Korea.

The topics that were debated at SHSMUN included, but were not limited to, private influence in space and the economic plan for natural disaster relief.

“I think it gives students [insight on] real world situations, it gives them a chance to do presentations and defend their positions,” elaborated Hooper, Central’s SHSMUN adviser.

The dress code was very formal. Delegates wore business attire with pins representing the school’s country of choice. In Central’s case, the North Korean flag was worn.

Participating public schools included Signal Mountain, Ooltewah, East Hamilton, and many more. Along with public schools, surrounding privates schools McCallie, Baylor, and GPS also represented delegations at SHSMUN.

Though the delegates acted as a group to convey the views of their countries, individual delegates split up into different committees to ensure their countries’ views were represented in different situations.

“We took up to 14 hours in the smaller committees, but it was good overall. There were chances to meet new people,” revealed John Britt, “We attempted to get our resolutions/bills to passed through general assembly. It was basically a competition with other schools.”

Students who participated gained many imperative skills. Skills that would be important for whatever field the students decide to take in the future.

“Model U.N helped with presentation skills and the ability to speak up in the face of opposition, since North Korea had a lot of opposition,” Britt concluded.