On Wednesday, March 29th, Academic Magnet students Will Donnellon (11th grade), Aidan Gomez (11th grade), and Haywood White (12th grade) departed school to take part in the Winthrop Cup, a three day Model United Nations event for high school students. For all those who do not know what Model UN consists of, it is a simulated United Nations where the countries attempt to find solutions to real world problems while representing their nations in the most true form possible. In finding these solutions, the representatives must research their country’s economic, political, and societal situations in order to create alliances and propose feasible treaties. Sponsored by Mrs. Peterson, the group was able to make the trip to Rock Hill and serve as delegates of Nicaragua.

White, Donnellon, and Gomez immediately focused on the drug trafficking problem in Nicaragua. They attempted to create a resolution alleviating the drug trafficking problem, but the rest of the UN were not convinced by the resolution and therefore it did not pass. Oddly enough, ISIS formed a western democracy with the assistance of the United States and tried to join the UN. According to Gomez, “we got pretty scared once ISIS formed a western democracy with the support of the U.S., but that’s life, and you must adapt to these situations.” In response to the happenings in the UN, Donnellon proposed a secret alliance, the Diamond League, which included Nicaragua, Algeria, Qatar, Japan, Poland, Turkey, DPRK, Venezuela, Russia, Syria, and Morocco. With this alliance, Donnellon believed that with the help of the Diamond League, “we were able to resist ISIS as much as possible”. Though the trio did not win any awards, they left Winthrop feeling good that they “put Nicaragua on the map” and “made people care about us and want to be our allies.”