The FerMUN is a “mock” United Nations Conference specifically designed for high school students, hosted in the United Nations in Geneva. The recommendations from the annual 3-day FerMUN Conference are tabled with the main UN board. Like the UN, FerMUN is a trilingual conference (English, Spanish, French). It is highly desirable for students to speak French and/or Spanish, although not absolutely necessary since translators/interpreters are available (also high school kids). In 2018, over 600 students from 45 schools in 20 countries are expected to join the event.
In January of 2018, two Senior students from Linuwel School, Caylin King and Adelaide Cowan, joined three other young Australians at this exciting world event. Our team was given Mexico as the country they were to represent and they were split into teams to tackle issues including bullying, Indigenous related topics and intellectual property. The group was escorted by Alyson Moore and Michael Winchester from Abbey World Travel who are the Australasian facilitators of this event.
Here is an email we received from Alyson during their time in Geneva;
‘We all adjusted to the new time zone quickly; are sleeping well, eating well, getting on with host families, mastering the public transport, and in good health and spirits!
Attached are some photos of the private meeting with WIPO Director
General (Frances Gurry) and with the Australian Head of Mission Geneva
(Elizabeth Wilde). The Opening Ceremony in the UN “Palace”
International Geneva was amazing!’
Caylin spoke to the whole school parent meeting about her experience which was a treat for all (Adelaide has finished at Linuwel) and please check out the Fermun sites online to get a bigger picture and see if your burgeoning world leader might like to consider this wonderful opportunity.
We also look forward to welcoming the Geneva host family students who will visit us during the year for a reciprocal homestay which is an ongoing part of the experience.