By Ashley Cohen
and Sammy Matson
Staff Writers
“Decorum, delegates!” At last weekend’s Los Angles Invitational Model United Nations
novice conference, sophomores, juniors and seniors in Costa’s MUN program helped run committees and oversee the operation of the conference. Chairs and vice-chairs of every committee in the conference worked for months to prepare. They all had specific duties that they had to take on in order for their committees to run successfully.” I thoroughly studied the topics that the delegates researched to make sure no student lied,” junior chair Joe Marine said, “During debate, my job was to make sure the committee ran smoothly, keep score, grade resolutions, assign awards and run the debate.” Although many sophomores served as legal (assistants to chairs and vice-chairs)in multiple committees at LAIMUN, some sophomores served as vice-chairs, positions normally only given to juniors. Sophomores were given the opportunity this year because some juniors were absent due to a coinciding conference in Paris that the MUN team also attended.” My responsibilities are generally parallel to those of the chair, plus or minus a few tasks, “ sophomore Eric Liu said. “They include running committees, knowing information relevant to the committee topics and other administrative tasks.” Although they do not debate, the juniors and sophomores said they benefited from the experience of serving on the dias at LAIMUN. The conference gives them the opportunity to see what an award-winning delegate would look like from the eyes of a chair or vice-chair.” It gives me a whole new perspective on what a chair would like or dislike,” junior Greg Domeno said. “It actually makes it easier to talk to them in an actual conference because you [get to] know what to ask and how to ask it to get the chair to
Like you.” Just as the upperclassmen are held to a higher standard by serving in advanced positions at LAIMUN, the Costa freshmen had the opportunity to experience prestigious novice conference due largely in part to the accelerated juniors and sophomores. Costa’s MUN team uses LAIMUN as a learning experience for its freshmen that are new to program, a beneficial tool to most young delegates.“LAIMUN is always a learning experience for the freshmen because they have to understand a more difficult conference,” junior Brian Martin said. “For many of them this is the first time that they will be graded just as seriously as they would be at an advanced debate.”
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