MUNA - Youth Leadership Program
The Rotary Club of Bacchus Marsh sponsored four local year 11 students to attend a Model United Nations Assembly (MUNA) camp at Burnbrae Lodge in Myrniong on the 26 and 27th of May. Natalie Guy and David Young from Bacchus Marsh College represented New Zealand and Demelza Feltham and Kate Sheddon from Bacchus Marsh Grammar represented England.
The purpose of the MUNA Camp is to engage students from school from all parts of Victoria to debate international issues within a formal setting. This requires students to plan and interpret several motions and discuss these motions from the point of view of the country they represent.
At a recent Rotary Club meeting Kate Sheddon addressed the club members and spoke of her experiences at the MUNA camp.
Kate explained that although feeling nervous she was “determined to go and speak without being scared or holding back with the nature of my arguments”. Kate also explained that she sensed all the participants were apprehensive but as the program progressed “the kids were all really encouraging one another and were supporting each other in just going that little bit further”.
Kate also said the students stayed up really late just talking and that it was a “really unique experience” to socialize with students from different places and backgrounds.
Kate told the members that the “best part of the weekend was the way the kids were able to run the whole thing by themselves”. This gave Kate and the other students a “really good sense of responsibility” and that the success of the weekend camp was largely due to the students themselves. Kate thanked the Members of the Rotary Club for sponsoring her and the other three students and that she “felt a sense of achievement”, that she had put her “time to good use” and “done something I could really be proud of”.
MUNA coordinator, Rotarian John Lucas, said that this is another example of the way Rotary International supports the youth of this area. “We know that we can entrust the future of this country and this planet to people like Kate.”
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