Brighton’s Model United Nations team received the Award of Excellence by taking second place in the National High School conference in New York on March 7-11. The team consisted of the head delegate Sean Whalen, Vice President Olivia Esplin, and members Sam Ellis, Jessica Arthurs, Frank Guillardo, and Emily and Natalie Calahan. The last time our M.U.N. team took nationals was two years ago, but Brighton has taken nationals at various times in the 16 years Mr. James Hodges has been involved with club, plus twenty or so years before him. “Everyone was strong,” Mr. Hodges said. He added that he is very proud of his students who excelled in public speaking, research and diplomacy. For preparation and to get into the competition, the members had to submit two five- to 10-page essays on a given topic such as the E.U. debt crisis and the unified military for the E.U. They competed against 3,000 other students from 150 schools in 25 countries such as Venezuela, Colombia, China, U.K., and Ireland to name a few. The committees they competed in were world health, European union, green peace, security, historical, and gender equality and empowerment for women. The purpose of these committees are to simulate the conditions that the U.N. would face in serious cases where the countries would have to debate and discuss to come to a conclusion. The average day would consist of going into the room for debate where the students would discuss a topic for about eight hours a day for four days straight. Out of the four days, the countries only came to one conclusion that they could all agree on.