By Megan Broughill TY 
Two groups of Transition Year in Athboy C.S. took part in an in-school MUN simulation (Model United Nations) with their peers on Wednesday the 7th of January. All students were allocated to be a delegate of a country including Russia, Portugal, USA, UK, Ireland, South Africa and India to name but a few! 
The delegates came dressed to impress in their formal wear and sat at their representative tables. Ms. Leddy, the schools MUN co-ordinator, explained what would happen throughout the day and how it would work. The topics given for resolutions were measures to eradicate the exploitation of children and measures to promote the safeguarding of unaccompanied Palestinian Child Refugees. 
For the first two hours the delegates were lobbying, making resolutions and figuring out who they could ally with for these resolutions. 
The debating started in earnest after lunch when the Resolutions that were submitted were formatted and then distributed to all delegates for them to analyse and review. All delegates took part in the debating and amending of the resolutions. Although the debating of the resolutions was extremely productive, we were unable to pass any resolutions during the simulation. Many delegates were unwilling to budge on certain clauses and there was a fallout between the east and west yet again! 
All the delegates had an incredible time learning how to engage in an M.U.N. conference. It was a very beneficial day and the students and staff involved enjoyed it very much.