Josephians Win Awards at Bilingual Youth Model United Nations Conference

By Ms Annie Wong
SJI fielded a team of 5 Josephians from across the 3 academies to take part in the second edition of the Bilingual Youth Model United Nations (BYMUN) conference organised by Nanyang Girls’ High School. The theme of the 2021 Bilingual Youth Model United Nations conference was “Transforming the world: Voices of Youth”. The conference aimed to provide student participants with an understanding of diplomacy and international relations while enhancing their bilingual proficiency, critical thinking skills, teamwork, and leadership abilities. It also sought to encourage diversity by providing students with the opportunity to share their perspectives, negotiate and collaborate on solutions to support the United Nations Sustainable Development goals. The SJI team - Lim Yee Kiat Zachary (ML403), Li Shaokai (ML403), Choo Yi Ming (FN302), Huang Yaoting (ML401) and Goh Kai Jun Kavan (ML402), were mentored by Ms Wai Pei Pin, who worked closely and tirelessly with the boys over the holidays to brainstorm and finetune the boys' presentations.

Our team took home the following 3 awards:

• Best Delegate - Goh Kai Jun Kavan 吴楷峻
  Disarmament and International Security Committee (DISEC) Council

• Honourable Mention - Choo Yi Ming 朱乙铭
  United Nations Commissions on the Status of Women (UNCSW) Council

• Outstanding Delegation - St Joseph's Institution

This is truly a remarkable achievement considering it is SJI's debut at the BYMUN, which has traditionally been attended by mostly SAP schools. Not only did our students have to prepare and write position papers in English and Chinese, they also had to debate issues that are of a very high level of difficulty and complexity in both languages. Their ability to communicate so precisely in both English and Chinese, as well as their capacity for spontaneous and logical reasoning and critical thinking was an exceptional performance to watch. The achievement of the "Outstanding Delegation award", where there were only 2 awards given to school delegations, is proof of SJI's strength in linguistic and cognitive capability.