Approximately 500 students from throughout the state gathered on Saturday, November 18th for the fourteenth annual Madison Area Model United Nations Conference (MADMUN), hosted this year at Middleton High School.
The annual event, established by Middleton High School in 2010, included students from Middleton, McFarland, Monona Grove, Madison West, Baraboo, Oregon, Verona, Lake Mills, Monroe, Marquette University High School, Divine Savior Holy Angels, Edgewood High School, Madison Country Day, Franklin, Grafton, Lakeland Union, Sheboygan North, Waukesha West, Plymouth, St. Ambrose Academy, Wanakee, Whitewater, and West Bend East & West.
Middleton students Claudia VanBendegom, Jay Gavin, Truman McRay, Henry Dickinson, Dima Llanos, and Clark Street’s Luke Rogers helped to plan and run this year’s MADMUN conference. The theme of this year's conference was “challenging authority”. Wisconsin Governor Tony Evers gave the opening ceremony’s keynote address.
Student participants represented several different countries and positions in the Social, Humanitarian and Cultural Committee, the World Health Organization, Environment Programme, the Human Rights Council, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, the European Union, U.S. Colleges, the 1991 August Coup and a joint crisis committee involving the 1962 Cuban, United States, and the Soviet Union Cabinets.
Conference delegates discussed a variety of contemporary and historical issues such as the gender imbalances in positions of power, the impacts of extreme poverty on global health, the prevention of the use of environmental pollutants globally, guardianship in the Middle East, Yemeni Civil War, and many more.
Middleton students Crystal Huang, Benjamin Bush, Julia Moriarty, Arya Choudhury, Mallak Gadelhak, Giuseppe Mangano, Katarine Miller, Dresden Drexler, Michael Raffel, Harper Patenaude, and Samantha Schoenke were each recognized for exceptional individual performance in their respective committees.
Model UN meets every Monday from 4:00-5:00 pm in the MHS North LMC and attends several conferences throughout North America each year. New members are welcome to join at any point during the year. If you are interested in more information, please contact club advisor Megan Sipiorski at msipiorski@mcpasd.k12.wi.us or Leigh Azkoul at lazkoul@mcpasd.k12.wi.us.