This month Benenden hosted our 12th Model UN conference – BMUN12 – which comprised around 400 students and staff and the standard of debate once again was extremely high. Despite the absence of the School Hall, the Opening and Closing Ceremony in the Sports Hall worked well. Linked to this venue change, instead of the usual General Assembly towards the end of the day we trialled a number of plenary sessions where committees joined with another who had been debating associated issues, making use of the flexibility of the SCN classrooms.
Plenty of good debate was had, with each committee led ably by Benenden chairs. Challenging discussion topics once again varied hugely, including questions on nuclear pollution, rights of the Kurdish people, human rights violations and military control in Sudan whilst Security Council debated the question of Kashmir. In addition we successfully held a Special Committee, based in the 1970s, which looked at potential changes to the Equal Rights Amendment of 1923. Overall BMUN12 showed Benenden MUN at its best. A very big thank you to everyone who took part and a huge thanks to everyone in the wider school who contributed to the success of the event.