Walt Giesen

Kade Chambers (left) and Minh Nguyen won the inaugural award for best overall resolution at the annual Mississippi Model Security Council Conference in March.

MSMS seniors Kade Chambers and Minh Nguyen won the inaugural award for best overall resolution out of all attending delegations at the annual Mississippi Model Security Council Conference last month. 

Model security councils are conferences in which participants represent a member nation of the United Nations Security Council and draft resolutions addressing global issues. 

In previous years, the MMSC Conference offered only two awards — best resolution and best delegation in each committee. Under new leadership, MMSC overhauled its award system this year, introducing an overall best resolution award across every committee. 

Chambers and Nguyen found each other as partners through a shared goal: representing the People’s Republic of China.

The two brought different but complementary backgrounds to the table. Nguyen, a member of the MSMS Senate, competed in speech policy debate last year, a competition that mirrors the international politics and diplomacy central to MMSC. His time in Young Democrats also had him engaging with national economic policy, a topic that came up again this year in committee.

Chambers has four years of debate experience, though the MMSC was entirely new to him. When MSMS cut its debate club this academic year, he joined MMSC to keep debating.

Initially, Nguyen said he was overcome with doubt when his name was called for the award.

“It was like a shock. I wasn’t really expecting to receive such an award, especially in a room of literally hundreds of people,” Nguyen said. “It was almost like I didn’t really deserve it, but in the end, it’s something I believe we received for a reason.”

Chambers said he was just as shocked as Nguyen to win, since the resolution they presented was not even their main one to begin with.

“We presented our secondary one [because] it got submitted wrong … and somehow, that one pretty surprised people,” Chambers said.

Chambers and Nguyen’s resolution “The Situation in Sudan, Darfur” addressed the ongoing civil war in Sudan and the humanitarian crisis unfolding within its borders — including what many have described as a genocide displacing thousands of refugees. In China’s favor, they proposed securing regional stability through humanitarian aid. The resolution also highlighted China’s economic interests in the region, particularly the oil reserves in Darfur, as an additional motivation for investment in restoring stability.

Chambers said much of the preparation for the resolution focused on delivery rather than content.

“You have the words on paper, but that can only go so far … you have to present it in a way that’s digestible to people and makes them amenable to what you’re saying,” Chambers said.

Nguyen said the resolution stood out because of its broad appeal among fellow delegates, and Chambers agreed the resolution’s neutral point of view made it compelling to the others.

“Many people can agree on the fact that this is something that should not continue,” Nguyen said. “We seek to establish peace in the region, and I believe that is in the best interests of all the member states, so it was agreeable.”

“[The resolution] was about helping others, like humanitarian aid, so I’m not shocked it got passed,” Chambers added. “A lot of the other resolutions were more hostile or trying to focus on some militaristic situation, but ours was just helping people who needed it.”

Chambers said he joined MMSC for fun and does not see himself pursuing anything similar, as he plans to study medicine. Nguyen, though, has bigger plans for it. With intentions to major in mechanical engineering and political science, fields rooted in public speaking and real-world debate, he said he sees himself staying involved in something similar to MMSC in the future.