Model UN Models Global Citizenship for Students

Andrew Greene

Andrew Greene

In his February 2015 post, Head of School Bryan Nixon asked various Whitby faculty and staff to share their thoughts on what makes today's kids global citizens. This week we hear from Andrew Greene, Upper School Individuals and Societies Teacher at Whitby.

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For the past two years, more than half of Whitby’s 7th and 8th graders have elected to participate in Montessori Model United Nations. Students spend a great deal of time researching the country they are representing and then a specific topic that they are assigned. In March, they will spend 3 days attending a conference in NYC with nearly 1000 other middle school students from all over the world. This has proven to be an amazing experience for a number of reasons, but most of all, it provides global outlook that is almost impossible to generate in the classroom. 

First, students gain perspective. They have to consider how a delegate from the country they are representing would think, not how an American would think. Since we have represented Russia, China and the Sudan in the past 2 years, needless to say these views are very different.

In addition, students are made aware of problems in other parts of the world and have to try to think of solutions. For example, students are writing position papers on topics such as Malnutrition, Access to Water and Sanitation, Access of Women to Education, Eradication of Poverty and Disaster Prevention among others.

This research gives students a combination of awareness of these problems, empathy for the people who suffer from them, as well as the idea that they can actually do something to help. It is a tremendous foundation for a middle schooler to build on.

Andrew Greene

Andrew Greene

Andy Greene is an Upper School teacher of Individuals and Societies who has the nearly impossible task of trying to get students to understand why people act the way they do and why societies are organized the way they are. Having visited 45 countries, some of which no longer exist, Andy focuses on getting students to see things from different perspectives.