Saint John's Model UN Excels at BUSUN: Students Showcase Diplomacy and Leadership
From November 8th to November 10th, 2024, 25 of Saint John’s MUN’s top student delegates took a trip down to Providence, Rhode Island in order to attend Brown University’s 28th annual Simulation of the United Nations (BUSUN), accompanied by faculty moderators Mr. Lizotte ‘89 and Dr. McClintock P’25. As always, we were driven to Providence by our friends at FTI Lines/Foxy Travel, owned by Mr. Keith Menard, ‘92. After arriving at the Providence Courtyard Marriott, the team enjoyed an amazing lunch at Blake’s Tavern to mark the opening of our National Conference season. Until the opening ceremonies, delegates spent their time at Providence Place, meeting delegates from other schools and exploring all the mall had to offer.
BUSUN’s structure included four intensive committee sessions, each lasting three to four hours, for a total of 12 hours of focused debate. Throughout these debate sessions, delegates spoke about their well-researched positions, created comprehensive solutions to the problems they were presented with, and wrote thorough papers that addressed all aspects of their issues. Special congratulations to Lawson Mitchell ‘25, Omkar Vaddi ‘25, Ronan Pigeaud ‘25, Rishik Paluri ‘26, Ryan Pergola ‘26, JR Chopra ‘26, Nishan Shaik ‘26, and Alex Krolewski ‘27 for their award commendations!
Overall, BUSUN was a breath of fresh air for all involved, with interesting and fun topics of debate that were kept comprehensive through the amazing work of the chairs and administrators involved in the planning and execution of this event. None of this would be possible without the outstanding work of our faculty moderators Mr. Chuck Abdella ‘92, Mr. Ben Lizotte ‘89, and Dr. Russ McClintock P’25.
Moving forward, SJMUN is currently preparing for its annual trip to the University of Chicago’s Model United Nations Conference (MUNUC) in February. The next three months will be spent preparing new delegates for the amazing experience of a MUN conference while continuing to hone their skills in weekly meetings. For more updates, please follow our new SJMUN Facebook page and/or on Instagram @saintjohnsmun.
