Vassar–Dutchess Community College Team Earns Honors at Model UN Conference
For more than two decades, teams of students from Vassar and Dutchess Community College (DCC) have represented dozens of countries at the annual National Model United Nations Conference in New York City. This year, four students from Vassar and seven from DCC earned an Honorable Mention Award for portraying the Tunisian delegation in advocating for several UN-sponsored programs and policies.
Approximately 2,000 students from the United States, Canada, and several other countries attended the conference, which was held from April 6 through 10. The bulk of the event was held at the Hilton Midtown Hotel, but the students spent about two hours on April 20 on the floor of the United Nations General Assembly.
The Vassar-DCC team prepared for the event by taking a course on Tunisia’s foreign policy and history taught by Adjunct Associate Professor of International Studies Matthew Murray. “Our students persevered through four days of challenging negotiations with people who began as strangers,” Murray said. “They remained in character and advocated for policies they did not necessarily agree with personally because that was their task. By the end of the conference, each of our delegations successfully shepherded their working papers through their respective committees, a testament to their ability and determination.”
Olivia Arenburg ’26, an International Studies major from Beverly, Massachusetts, said she had represented Jordan in a Model UN conference in 2024, “but every experience is different depending on the country you represent,” she explained. “We started reading about Tunisia’s domestic and foreign policy over Winter Break before the class started, so we were steeped in knowledge of how Tunisia was likely to vote and how we could advocate for the country’s positions when we got to the conference.”
One of Arenburg’s tasks was to advocate for UN funding for job training programs, especially for youth, and she was able to help shepherd that resolution through her committee successfully. She said all of the participants took their responsibility for representing the positions of their respective countries seriously, regardless of their own personal political views. “It was symbolic that the names of our countries on the lanyards we wore were larger than our own names,” she said.
DCC student Kaiden Tadin, who hopes to enroll at Vassar next fall, said he knew “virtually nothing” about Tunisia before he registered for the Model UN course. “Professor Murray pushed us really hard to become immersed in our subject matter, and it really paid off,” he said. “I think we were among the most prepared delegation at the conference.”
Tadin said he had partnered with members of the Danish delegation to convince the General Assembly to adopt a resolution on combating terrorism through deradicalization programs by setting up meetings for youth with religious leaders, something that has been done in Saudi Arabia and has seen great success.
One of the most gratifying moments Tadin had at the conference was meeting a student from Tunisia shortly before the event ended. “She told me she was really impressed with how I had represented her country,” he said. “That was the ultimate compliment. That made me so proud of how I represented not only myself but my school.”
Other members of the Hudson Valley Model UN Team were Vassar students Michael Martinez ’28 and Matthew Leger ’29, and Language Fellow Antonella Iaffaldano; and DCC students Kayla Arroyo, Tate Shea, Adam Murphy, Eduardo De Leon, Emmet Arimborgo, and Hanna Kelleher.