John Jay College Of Criminal Justice | The City University of New York

   

For the 10th consecutive year, a team from John Jay College’s United Nations Student Association has won multiple awards at the annual National Model United Nations (NMUN) Conference, including an Honorable Mention Delegation Award.

The team was led by head delegate John Bae, a senior BA/MA student in Criminal Justice, along with faculty adviser Professor Jacques Fomerand of the Department of Political Science.

From April 13-17, the students gathered at the Sheraton and Hilton hotels in New York for the annual conference, which pitted some 5,500 students from colleges and universities from around the U.S. and more than 30 foreign countries in a global showdown in which a wide variety of pressing international issues were explored and debated.

Each year, NMUN delegations represent a different member country of the United Nations, with John Jay this year representing Greece, the nation that, coincidentally, will serve as the host site for John Jay’s 2014 Biennial International Conference, which this year focuses on “The Rule of Law in an Era of Change: Security, Social Justice and Inclusive Governance.” The John Jay students served as delegates on a number of Model U.N. committees, in which they deliberated, negotiated, drafted and adopted resolutions and reports on issues that included agriculture development and food security, violence against women, developing sustainable biofuels, emergency responses for displaced populations, and preventing child mortality through immunizations.

In the end, the John Jay team walked away with awards for Outstanding Position Papers in General Assembly First, Second, Fourth, United Nations Environment Programme and United Nations Industrial Development Organization.

“They may be physically exhausted and sleep-weary but they have every good reason to be elated and to share a legitimate sense of accomplishment,” Bae said of his teammates.

The 25-member team had trained doggedly and systematically for the conference since the middle of the fall semester, honing research and writing skills, rehearsing public speaking, refining their consensus-building techniques and mastering the intricacies of U.N. procedures. ”It was hard work,” said Fomerand, “but all students were deeply engaged and committed.”

The 2014 Model United Nations Team included students from a variety of disciplines, executives of five student organizations, the Peer Ambassadors program, the Honors program, McNair scholars, and the BA/MA program. These students, with roots in over 20 countries, were: John Bae, Imtashal Tariq, Katherine Azcona, Ana Paredes, Mateo Garcia, Ossama Ayesh, Erin Riley, Onicker Kennedy, Lodoe Gyatso, Liner Nuñez, Valeriya Metla, Tricia Ramcharit, James Williams, Claudia Hurtado, Kehinde Oladele, Shobit Manchanda, Thamanna Hussain, Marina Kumskova, Ofia Begum, Ali Haxhijaj, Delion Diaz, Brenda Gonzalez, Alaa Alamin, Jade Jetjomlong and Norhan Ahmed.