Two high schools from the Shelby County School District – Montevallo High School and Chelsea High School – had delegates participate for the first time in the University of Alabama Model United Nations Conference this weekend in Tuscaloosa.

High schools from across the southeast converged on the UA campus to solve a variety of world issues, ranging from global terrorism and ISIS to healthcare access for Syrian refugees. Students prepared and researched countries to which they were assigned and wrote papers and speeches to communicate their stance on these various issues.

MHS represented the countries of China and Greece in various committees while CHHS represented India, New Zealand, and North Korea in addition to various crisis committees as well.  Montevallo’s team was sponsored by Lee Pastor and Chelsea’s team by Jessica Newman.

“Students not only learned valuable interpersonal and problem-solving skills such as collaboration, diplomacy, policy making, and public speaking but they had a fun time doing it as well,” said MHS teacher Lee Pastor. “Who knows? We could have some future world leaders in our midst who have the skills and the determination needed to make a difference in our world today!”