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Preparing for Prague Student Summit

Youth learn what it is like to work for UN, NATO

November 14th, 2007 issue

By Martina Čermáková

COURTESY PHOTO
Students from last year's summit were paired off in teams that represented members of NATO, the UN and the EU.
COURTESY PHOTO
Organizers of the Prague summit say they hope the experience teaches students how to hone their team-building skills.
FOR THE POST
Looking back at those precarious high-school years, most people probably conjure up hazy memories of parties, driver’s training classes and first crushes — not workshops, strategic planning sessions and global conferences.
Yet, this is the reality for more than 400 students from around the Czech Republic who were tapped to participate in the second annual Prague Student Summit. The summit takes the learn-by-doing concept to a new level by allowing students to simulate what it would be like to work in the United Nations, the European Union or NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization).
Participating students come together during five summit workshops throughout the school year. And, depending on what group they are in, discuss key issues and concerns regarding the global body they are simulating. Through these meetings, organizers say they hope to strengthen students’ critical thinking skills, emphasize teamwork and encourage higher education goals, among other things. The meetings will culminate in March during a final round of negotiations.
In Model NATO — the only one of the three conducted in English — and Model EU, countries are assigned to individuals, while, in Model UN, groups of five to seven delegates represent a nation.
During the preceding five workshops — Model EU participants only have two — the student delegates are armed with knowledge presented to them by guest lecturers, who, in the past, have included former Foreign Affairs Minister Cyril Svoboda, former Defense Minister Jiří Šedivý and the well-respected journalist Petra Procházková.
Attendance is never a problem, says Jakub Eberle, the principal coordinator of the summit. These students want to participate in the workshops, and Eberle estimates at least 80 percent show up to all of the scheduled meetings. But just showing up isn’t enough.
“The workshops don’t prepare one fully,” says Dominik Jandl, a political science student at Charles University and a four-year veteran participant of Model UN. “You need to read newspapers daily, keep track of your country’s situation and regularly check the country’s Foreign Ministry’s Web site.”
It’s a great way to develop information-retrieval skills that the Czech educational system often neglects, Eberle says.
“The norm [at high schools] is that you spend the class just noting down things the professor presents, and doing some reading,” he explains.
Labeled as “an alternative education,” the summit requires that students absorb the information and are able to present and discuss the issues with other delegations — which requires a different kind of skill set than simply memorizing facts in a textbook, Eberle notes.
The research can get tough, however, if you’re assigned a country like Indonesia, for instance, where materials are scarce, Jandl points out. But what is most valuable, he says, is the chance to cooperate with the assigned country’s embassy here in Prague.
Kateřina Pleskotová, a student at the Nad Štolou gymnasium and a delegate for Turkey in last year’s Model NATO, discovered this last year. Prior to the 2007 summit, she managed to snag a two-and-a-half-hour interview with the Turkish Embassy in Prague.
“It’s easy researching the country’s number of inhabitants, but some themes are really difficult to find out about,” she says.
With Model NATO, the number of applications is rather low because many applicants underestimate themselves when it comes to the complex themes discussed in this group, Eberle says.
Model EU and Model NATO are relatively recent additions to the 13-year-old Prague Model UN. To differentiate the two new modules, Model EU is only accessible to university students, while Model NATO uses English as its working language.
Despite targeting international schools in addition to Czech high schools, Model NATO drew a Czech-only crowd, Pleskotová says, adding that “you don’t need to know the grammatical nuances, just be able to communicate your ideas.”
Pleskotová applied for Model NATO to practice her English skills, and she’s doing it again this year. Bringing in English, the whole project appears more “polished,” she notes. “Negotiating and discussing in English sounds different and more glamorous than when you are discussing [these international issues] using Czech words,” Pleskotová adds.
Jandl senses this year’s summit will see a rise in quality, especially among the delegates themselves.
“Many of the delegates could represent the country [they are representing in the summit] in real life,” he says. “Once a resolution was passed [by Model UN], and a week later, the same resolution was passed by the [real] UN.”
Eberle argues that, in an indirect way, the summit leaves a distinct footprint on the world outside the Prague Conference Centre, where final negotiations are held each spring. “By expanding and changing views of the students, we are creating pressure — pressure that in turn alters things in the real world,” he says.
Opening students’ eyes and expanding their horizons are key aims, Eberle adds. At the summit, “students realize that things aren’t as simple as they seem.”
For Jandl, that realization came right before he delivered his first speech before the 400-person crowd. He’d spent a lot of time practicing his delivery without trembling. But still, nothing quite prepared him for the actual moment where he stood before his peers and opened his mouth.
“The worst part is the moment before you begin to speak,” he says, thinking back to that day.
It’s an experience that many of the student delegates will soon get a chance of living for themselves.  
University students who are fluent in Czech and interested in participating in Model EU can still apply until Dec. 1. Go to www.studentsummit.cz to fill out an application. The application process for next year’s summit will open in September.
Martina Čermáková can be reached at specialsection@praguepost.com


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