Father
Judge: Best of the best
By
Lou Baldwin
Special to the CS&T
You don’t want to get into a foreign policy debate with kids from
Father Judge High School’s Model U.N. Club. At a May 18-20 competition
held at the U.N., they were voted best of the best.
They won the Secretary General’s prize in a competition that included
more than 2,300 secondary-school students from around the world.
It was the second top prize for Father Judge, which won the competition
in 2001. Father Judge is the only school ever to win twice.
Northeast Catholic High School, which represented Cameroon, won honorable
mention at the U.N. competition. And West Catholic High School, representing
the Solomon Islands, also received honorable mention.
Before competing in the Big Apple, the budding diplomats from Father Judge,
the Northeast Philadelphia archdiocesan high school, had an undefeated
record in approximately 10 warm-up Model U.N. sessions around the Delaware
Valley, and they tied for first place in the national championship at
Georgetown University in February.
“We went through a lot of training,” said Michael Imbrenda,
president of Father Judge’s 45-member club. Twenty members went
to New York.
“Winning was a big surprise — but we were hoping to win,”
Imbrenda said. “It’s really exciting to be voted best, and
it’s fun to match your skills against so many others.”
Especially gratifying to him is that Judge won in a highly competitive
academic contest, since academics is what schools is all about.
Through the club, the Father Judge students gained a greater appreciation
of diverse opinions on a variety of foreign policy issues, and picked
up invaluable skills in the art of negotiation, conflict resolution, and
networking, as well as the discipline of parliamentary procedures.
Imbrenda will be heading to Washington’s American University next
year, where, assisted by a $20,000 grant, he’ll study international
relations, the career he hopes to pursue in life.
In the Model U.N. competitions, schools are given countries they must
represent, chosen by lot.
For the New York competition, Father Judge drew Venezuela and the neighboring
country of Suriname — two nations whose foreign policies are radically
different from that of the United States.
With a month or so to prepare, the students scanned magazines and searched
the Internet to discover the policy positions of their assigned countries,
on issues such as human rights, terrorism, nuclear energy, poverty and
health, and global warming.
During the competition, teams of two served on various mock committees,
arguing the known positions of their selected countries.
“I think the hardest one was the General Assembly — getting
your ideas across in a gigantic room like that,” Imbrenda said.
Two Father Judge seniors, Timothy Dooley and John Cooke, were singled
out for a special award — an engraved gavel — for their work
in representing Venezuela on the Model U.N. Commission for Human Rights.
Next year, Cooke will study international relations at the most prestigious
and sought-after school in that field in the United States — Georgetown
University.
Dooley is headed for Seton Hall University, where he, too, will study
Foreign Relations. He missed the first few competitions this year because
they conflicted with Judge’s football schedule — he was backup
strong safety.
For the Model U.N. competitions, Father Judge has represented France,
China, Russia, Iraq and India. Usually that involves a couple hours of
club strategy meetings each week, and a couple of hours of research —
which means about 20 hours of competition preparation a month.
“I thought the Washington competition was harder than New York,”
Dooley said. “I represented Adlai Stevenson for the U.S. during
the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis.”
Father Judge high school is not known to be a hotbed of radicalism, and
Dooley considers himself a conservative Republican.
The Venezuela of President Hugo Chavez is generally opposed to any policy
put forth by the United States, but the students, like all diplomats,
must suspend their own beliefs as they represent the views of their client
countries.
In one sense, Dooley thinks it’s easier to represent countries such
as Iran and Venezuela, which have radical views, because “people
pay attention.”
Charles O’Neill, a junior, doesn’t agree with the policies
of President Chavez either. “But you have to put on the mask,”
he said. “It’s difficult when you first write your position
paper, but you warm up to it. I’m in theatrics, and I use the same
skills in Model U.N.”
O’Neill finds the many hours of preparation worth the effort, and
it is especially gratifying for him to see Judge — a medium sized,
diocesan school — go toe-to-toe with some of the country’s
most prestigious, high-tuition academies — and win. “We don’t
have a $10,000 tuition,’ he said.
He will serve as club president next year. The students will begin Oct.
7 with a match at West Catholic, and O’Neill looks forward to trying
to match this year’s sterling record.
“We have a great group of underclassmen in the club,” he said.
A repeat is not impossible, and the next time would make it a hat trick
for Father Judge.
The Judge students are unanimous in giving credit for their success to
their club moderator, Oblate Father John Hurley, who also coaches the
teams at Northeast Catholic High School and Salesianum High School in
Wilmington.
Father Hurley was on hand June 15, as Councilwoman Joan Krajewski introduced
the club members to the Philadelphia City Council, where they were given
a citation by Council President Anna Verna for the honor they brought
to their school and city.
Father Hurley, who no longer teaches, is the director of foreign mission
of the Oblates of St. Francis De Sales. He travels the country, but when
he is home in Philadelphia, he mentors the Model U.N. clubs at the area’s
Oblate schools as a hobby. He was introduced to the program 51 years ago,
during his freshman year at Salesianum , and he’s carried the program
to every school where he’s been assigned — starting with Northeast
Catholic in 1969 — with time out for service as a missionary in
South Africa.
He’s proud of the record Father Judge has amassed, which includes
12 national titles. And he’s equally proud of the other schools
he coaches.
The archiocesan high schools that received honorable mentions —
Northeast Catholic and West Catholic — have their own connection
to Father Hurley, Philadelphia’s dean of the Model U.N.
Their coach is Christian Brother John Luczkowski. “He’s a
1999 graduate of North Catholic,” Father Hurley said. “He
was in our program.”
The tradition continues.
Lou Baldwin is a member of St. Leo Parish and a freelance writer.