High School Team Beats Odds, Wins Title

They went into the competition with fewer students per committee.

But Huntington Beach High School’s team nonetheless recently won the best delegation award at the 12th annual Ivy League Model United Nations Conference in Philadelphia.

“We were under the impression that there could only be a single student on each [Model UN] committee,” said Lynn Aase, a teacher advisor for the Huntington Beach students. “But when we got there, we found the other high schools had two students on each of the committees. So we felt really proud to overcome that handicap.”

The Huntington Beach delegation represented two nations, India and Japan. The India delegation won the Benjamin Franklin Silver Cup for first place, and the Huntington Beach students acting as the Japan delegation won fourth place.

Twenty-eight Huntington Beach High students, all seniors, took part in the event. They were accompanied by Aase and Bill Seckington, the high school’s other Model UN teacher advisor, and a parent, Dixie Watson.

Fifty-four high schools from 14 states competed. Huntington Beach was the only high school from California.

Aase said the first-place win was particularly gratifying because “it’s a major conference, it’s one of the big ones.”

Huntington Beach High’s Model UN, founded in 1972, has won 28 national competitions during those 24 years.