Liberty’s Model United Nations Club recently attended Viking Model U.N. (VIKMUN) at Western Washington University in Bellingham, the largest competitive high school Model U.N. Conference in the Pacific Northwest.

At VIKMUN each club is assigned a country to represent in one of eight committees. As ambassadors for their assigned countries, the participants discuss international issues and possible solutions.

Although it was Liberty’s first year participating in the conference, the Model United Nations club tied for first for Best Overall Delegation out of a total of 27 clubs participating.

“To win the overall delegation prize everyone really had to come together as a team,” junior Allegra Messina said. “They were keeping scores and tallies on how everyone worked so everyone’s job really contributed to that as well as the hard work that everyone put in beforehand and at the conference. Everyone presented themselves really well.”

In addition to Best Overall Delegation, Liberty claimed titles on the individual level. Juniors Allegra Messina and Signe Stroming were awarded Most Diplomatic in the G20 and Commission on the Status of Women, respectively. Junior Megan Villablanca was awarded Most Outstanding in the International Court of Justice.

“Our team was only freshmen and juniors so it’s cool to see how we worked well together across the grade separation,” Messina said. “We learned a lot this year as well. It was an interesting experience to learn things you don’t get a chance to apply that often, like public speaking and social networking on a personal level.”