2021 Global GLEC Conference Final Report (March 2022)

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English Speech and Essay Writing Contest on the United Nations and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)

Published by the Global Leadership English Challenge Seoul, Republic of Korea Email: glec@hopetofuture.org Website: www.gleader.org

Writer and Editor in-Chief Hyeonkyung Ha Assistant Editors Jihoon Huh Sangwoo Sul Euikyeong Lee Taeeun Kim Geon Yoon Chaeeun Lee Seuk Jang Nathan Cho

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Congratulatory Remark Since the first launch of ‘Global Leadership English Challenge’ in 2012, we have never skipped a single year but could not make for 2020 due to the worldwide COVID-19 pandemic. I know the pandemic should be one of the biggest challenges to your education environment as well, but I am so happy that we could overcome and finally gather here as a community. As an international NGO associated with UN DGC, it is our mission to urge domestic and international efforts to achieve Sustainable Development Goals which all United Nations Member States adopted in 2015 to work for the full implementation by 2030.

As COVID-19 is spreading human suffering destabilizing the global economy and upending the lives of billions of people around the globe, I expect that past GLEC competition in 2021 could provide the chance to understand various aspects of international issues. Also, I hope you could learn something new on how COVID-19 has affected every aspect of our lives, and how we live and interact with each other has changed.

With the themes of ‘Education Inequality,’ ‘Carbon Neutralization and Cop26,’ ‘Disarmament and Peace,’ which agendas set for topics on the 2030 Agenda, I also hope you could examine global problems and diversify international perspectives. Hence, during the conference, I expect you to commit to your passion and reach your goals.

GGC is more than a place for discussion, but is a forum where you could come up with creative solutions on given agenda for a common goal regardless of ages and nationalities. I hope that you will all go through a discussion process to solve international issues as a ‘global citizen,’ seek for a solution on global challenges, and bring up effective and innovative resolutions with brilliant ideas. Also, as the Article of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights says that “we should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood,” I hope this conference will be an opportunity and meaningful activity for you to work together to achieve common goals and interests as global citizens.

Last but not least, each of you is responsible for providing an aggressive approach for a mutual goal and showing the best cooperation. Once again, welcome to Global GLEC Conference and I wish a good time for all of you.

Jin-Hoan Choung President and Head Director Hope to the Future Association

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Table of Contents

1.

2.

3.

About GGC

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p5

Introduction

p6

Overview

p7

Theme

p8

Timeline

p9

Academic Debate

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p11

About Debate

p12

Theme 1: Education Inequality and COVID-19

p13

Theme 2: COP26 and Climate Change

p15

Theme 3: Disarmament and Peace

p17

Group Discussion & SDGs Resolution

-----------------------------

p64

Middle School Track Team A

p65

Team B

p66

High School Track Team A

p69

Team B

p71

4.

Individual Report

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5.

Reflection from Awardees

6.

7.

p73

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p122

Photo Gallery

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p126

Organizations

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Host

p131

Sponsors

p132

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INTRODUCTION ‘Global Leadership English Challenge’ is an English Speech and Essay Writing Contest on the topics of the United Nations and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). With the world facing seemingly unresolvable matters, which range from environmental issues to refugee crises, GLEC aims to raise awareness and understanding of contemporary global issues among the participating students. Participants are expected to share their views on current issues and offer potential solutions to multifaceted global problems on the given themes based on their grade level. Participants will go through two stages (preliminary round and final round) in their respective countries, and the final round winners will be invited to participate in the GLEC Global Conference, a four-day international academic conference on the UN and the SDGs. 'Global GLEC Conference (GGC)' is an international academic conference where worldwide GLEC winners from Korea, Vietnam, India, China, and Japan, and talented students from each country interact with one another. Participants from all around the globe will be able to seek methods of cooperation on the international agenda through lectures of UN experts and team debates related to the SDGs. In addition, students are expected to develop capacity as global citizens through opportunities to cultivate global leadership, exchange or experience various cultures and develop their future careers through presentation training and career development sessions.

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OVERVIEW Title

 Global GLEC Conference 2021

Date

 11 March (Fri.) ~ 13 March (Sun.) 2022

Language

 English

Program

    

Participants

Keynote Speech by UN High Officials Expert Lecture from UN Headquarters and International Organizations Career Development Session In-depth Debate on UN Agenda Youth Networking Event

 Student participants: 80 people  Youth staff: 5 people  HFA staff: 4 people

Grade

Student List

Elementary School

Arya V. Kaggal, Ayul Seo, Genill Marquisse Pullan, Hara Jang, Kayeon Park, Lee Yun-Jen, Mayuka Rajesh, Parvani Akhilesh, Yewon Park, Yunseong Kim

Middle School

Anika Goel, Đặng Hồng Hà, Dayoung Lee, Geon Hyeon Kim, Hoang Hoa Tue Giang, Hsueh-Jui Wang, Hyeseong Ju (Kyle), Hyungeon (Andrew) Chung, La Le Quynh Anh, Mai Nam Anh, Nhật Anh Trang Nguyễn, Nyneishia Yogesh, Pham Tran Bao Chau, Riya V. Kaggal, Sippakorn Wongsaming, Thanadhol Sutapakdi, Thuy Anh Nguyen, Thy Le Vu Quynh, Nguyen An Thy, Tuan Tran, Yu-Chien Chang, Yueun Park, Sunaina Prashanth

High School

Chaen Yoon, Chaeni Lee, Chalida Pitimontreekul, Dahyeon Nam, Daine Hwang, Donghwan Yi, Franchesca Wyette Gaerlan, Gia Ninh Đàm, Heejae Jeong, Jisun Hwang, Joachim Joseph Ramirez, Juha Bae, Junehee Lee, Juseok Oh, Kazandra Alexis Morallos, Louis Benedict Sison, Maxine Angelica J. Dela Cruz, Naphatjutha Rajatabhothi, Nguyễn Đỗ Thảo Anh, Nick Woohyuk Choi, Seoyeon Choi, Seungwoo Baik, Sooa Cho, Thanh Thảo Phan, Trần Nam Sơn, An Lý, Thanet Reantongcome

University

Chanida Sangchuan, Chau Vu, Frances Summer Dale Dy, Giang Hà, Manato Iizuka, Thao Nguyen Phuong, Trang Nguyen

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THEME

“On September 25th 2015, the UN Member States adopted a set of goals to end poverty, protect the planet and ensure prosperity for all as part of a new sustainable development agenda. Each goal has specific targets to be achieved over the next 15 years.”

The SDGs, build on the success of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) and aim to go further to end all forms of poverty. The new Goals are unique in that they call for action by all countries, poor, rich and middle-income to promote prosperity while protecting the planet. They recognize that ending poverty must go hand-in-hand with strategies that build economic growth and addresses a range of social needs including education, health, social protection, and job opportunities, while tackling climate change and environmental protection. While the SDGs are not legally binding, governments are expected to take ownership and establish national frameworks for the achievement of the 17 Goals. Countries have the primary responsibility for follow-up and review of the progress made in implementing the Goals, which will require quality, accessible and timely data collection.

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TIMELINE Day 1

11 March (Fri.)

8:00pm – 7:30pm

Registration

8:30pm – 9:00pm

Opening Ceremony

9:00pm – 9:30pm

Orientation

9:30pm – 11:00pm

[Academic Debate 1] # Topic 1: Education Inequality and COVID-19 # Topic 2: Cop26 and Climate Change # Topic 3: Disarmament and Peace

11:00pm – 12:00pm

[UN Tour] Speaker: UN Guided Tours Team Topic: UN’s Work on Global Challenges (Focus on Asia & Pacific Region)

Day 2

12 March (Sat.)

10:00am – 11:30am

[UN Briefing] Speaker: Dr. Abraham Joseph, former) UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs (UN DESA) Topic: New Challenges in the International Society

11:30pm – 1:00pm

[Academic Debate 2] # Topic 1: Education Inequality and COVID-19 # Topic 2: Cop26 and Climate Change # Topic 3: Disarmament and Peace

1:00pm – 2:00pm

Lunch Break

2:00pm – 3:00pm

[Career Development Session] Speaker: Dr. Kenji Yokoyama, Dean for External Relations, NUCB Business School Topic: Why is Youth Education Important?

3:00pm – 4:30pm

[SDGs Group Activity 1] # Middle School Track: COVID-19 and Children’s Rights

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# High School Track: Fair Vaccine Distribution and Global Governance 4:30pm – 5:30pm

[Side Event] Cultural Exchange

5:30pm – 6:30pm

[Ivy League Session] Meeting with GLEC Winners Speaker: Chaerin Park (University of Pennsylvania Huntsman Program ’26)

6:30pm – 7:00pm

[Career Development Session] Speaker: Freddy Mason Topic: Studying Abroad and International Admissions to NUCB

Day 3

13 March (Sun.)

10:30am – 11:30am

Daily Briefing

11:30am – 1:00pm

[Special COVID-19 Session] Speaker: Dr. Kadir Jun AYHAN, Ewha Womans University Topic: Global Cooperation for the Post-COVID-Era

1:00pm – 2:00pm

Lunch Break

2:00pm – 3:00pm

[SDG Group Activity 2] # Middle School Track: COVID-19 and Children’s Rights # High School Track: Fair Vaccine Distribution and Global Governance

3:00pm – 4:00pm

[Quiz Competition] Golden Bell Show

4:00pm – 5:00pm

Closing Ceremony

10

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ABOUT DEBATE A debate is a form of public discourse. Typically, two teams are presented with a proposition that they will debate, with each team given a set period of time to prepare their arguments. Debates are performed in a structured setting that gives all participants a chance to present and defend their arguments.

The core of debate is to examine every side of important and controversial issues in an atmosphere of reasoned argument and respectful discourse. The enormous effort that students put forth to succeed in this intellectually excisting activity is truly inspiring. Through enormous efforts, debaters can get rigorous and critical thinking, improve academic skills and maturity to overcome adversity, and enjoy the academic and occupational achievement. For these benefits, Global GLEC Conference gives opportunities for students to share ideas and experience cultural exchanges globally. We followed the form of Cross-Examination, including some periods of time between speeches where opponents ask each other questions to clarify and better understand each other’s case.

Order

Speeches/Cross-Examinations

Time (min.)

1

1st Affirmative Constructive Speech (1AC)

6

2

Cross-Examination by the Negative Team

3

3

1st Negative Constructive Speech (1NC)

6

4

Cross-Examination by the Affirmative Team

3

5

2nd Affirmative Constructive Speech (2AC)

6

6

Cross-Examination by the Negative Team

3

7

2nd Negative Constructive Speech (2NC)

6

8

Cross-Examination by the Affirmative Team

3

9

1st Negative Rebuttal Speech (1NR)

6

10

1st Affirmative Rebuttal Speech (1AR)

6

11

2nd Negative Rebuttal Speech (2NR)

6

12

2nd Affirmative Rebuttal Speech (2AR)

6

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[Theme 1] Education Inequality and COVID-19

COVID‑19 has wreaked havoc worldwide on children’s learning and well-being. Before the pandemic, progress in education was already too slow to achieve Goal 4 by 2030. One year into the crisis, two in three students were still affected by full or partial school closures. One hundred million more children than before fail to demonstrate basic reading skills. The poorest and most vulnerable children are bearing the brunt of the crisis, exacerbating longstanding inequalities.

Many risk never returning to school; some are forced into child marriage or child labour. Special efforts are required to recover learning losses caused by COVID-19. However, an estimated 65 per cent of Governments in low- and lower-middle-income countries, and 35 per cent in uppermiddle- and high-income countries have reduced funding for education since the onset of the pandemic.

Exceptional measures are needed to get students back on track after a catastrophic year for education Even before COVID-19, the world was not on track to meet reading and mathematics targets. In 2019, only 59 per cent of children of grade three age were proficient in reading. The pandemic is projected to cause an additional 101 million children (roughly 9 per cent of those in primary and lower secondary school) to fall below the minimum reading proficiency threshold, increasing the total number of students falling behind to 584 million in 2020. This wipes out the progress achieved in education over the past 20 years. Similar declines are observed in the area of mathematics.

Nearly two thirds of the children falling behind live in Central and Southern Asia and Eastern and South-Eastern Asia. The proficiency rate was already very low in sub-Saharan Africa before the pandemic, so learning losses in this region would likely occur among children below the minimum level of proficiency. Recovery of the learning deficit globally could occur by 2024, but only if extraordinary efforts are made.

Good progress in early childhood education has been brought to a halt by the pandemic Pre-COVID-19 data for 2012–2020 drawn from 76 mostly low- and middle-income countries and territories show that around 7 in 10 children aged 3 and 4 years are developmentally on track.

Participation in organized pre-primary learning (one year before the official age for primary

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school entry) rose steadily before the pandemic, from 65 per cent in 2010 to 73 per cent in 2019, with gender parity achieved in every region. However, considerable variation was found among regions. Participation in early learning in 2019 was 43 per cent in sub-Saharan Africa, compared with 96 per cent in Latin American and the Caribbean. This progress has been threatened since 2020, since childcare and early education facilities have closed in most countries. Many young children are now entirely reliant on their parents or other caregivers at home. Unsafe conditions, negative interactions with caregivers, and lack of adequate stimulation and learning opportunities during the early years can diminish children’s chances of success throughout their lives.

Building back better from the crisis can start with basic school infrastructure, which is sorely lacking in many countries Improving basic school infrastructure is critical for school reopening, a first step on the road to recovery from COVID-19. Data from 2016 to 2019 show that, globally, more than a fifth of primary schools lacked access to basic drinking water or single-sex toilets, more than a third lacked basic handwashing facilities, and one in four did not have electricity. Internet service and computers in schools are even more scarce. Schools in LDCs face the biggest challenges. Almost half of primary schools in LDCs lack single-sex toilets—an important factor in girls’ attendance— and more than two thirds are without electricity. The pandemic is spotlighting the importance of adequate sanitation facilities in keeping children safe at school and the need for ICT infrastructure to support remote learning. It is also highlighting additional infrastructure considerations, such as adequate classroom space, air filtration in school buildings, and access to the Internet and computers at home. The economic fallout of the crisis on education budgets and capital spending is likely to affect the ability of countries to make progress towards these ends, especially in the poorest countries.

Reference: https://unstats.un.org/sdgs/report/2021/

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[Theme 2] COP26 and Climate Change

Despite a pandemic-related economic slowdown, the climate crisis continues largely unabated. A temporary reduction in human activities resulted in a dip in emissions. However, concentrations of greenhouse gases continued to increase in 2020, reaching new record highs. It was one of the three warmest years on record, with the global average temperature about 1.2°C above the 1850– 1900 baseline. The world remains woefully off track in meeting the Paris Agreement target of limiting global warming to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels and reaching net-zero carbon dioxide CO2 emissions globally by 2050.

In the face of looming catastrophe, climate action is gaining momentum. In June 2020, the Race to Zero campaign was launched to form a coalition of businesses, cities, regions and investors around net-zero carbon emission initiatives, and set out specific near-term tipping points for more than 20 sectors of the global economy. As of December 2020, over two thirds of the world’s GDP was being generated in places with actual or intended “net zero by 2050” targets, covering over half of the world’s population and emissions.

The global pandemic has laid bare humanity’s vulnerabilities. It has shown the world how much damage can be wreaked by a crisis that pales in comparison to a full-scale climate emergency. We must heed this wake-up call and seize the opportunity to rebuild in a way that will reduce emissions and increase resilience to climate change.

Greenhouse gas emissions will continue to increase without critical steps to shift economies towards carbon neutrality In 2015, 196 Parties to the Paris Agreement committed to transforming their development trajectories towards sustainability and called for limiting global warming to well below 2°C – ideally 1.5°C – above pre-industrial levels. To meet these goals, global carbon dioxide emissions need to be reduced by 45 per cent by 2030 from 2010 levels, and reach net-zero emissions by 2050. Greenhouse gas concentrations reached new highs in 2020, with globally averaged mole fractions of CO2 exceeding 410 parts per million.

The COVID-19 pandemic significantly reduced human activities in 2020, leading to a temporary fall in CO2emissions. Developed countries saw the steepest declines, averaging drops of almost

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10 per cent, while emissions from developing countries fell by 4 per cent relative to 2019. Despite the temporary reduction in emissions overall in 2020, real-time data from specific locations, including Mauna Loa, United States, and Cape Grim, Tasmania, indicate that concentration levels of CO2, methane and nitrous oxide continued to increase in 2020. By December 2020, emissions had fully rebounded and registered 2 per cent higher than the same month in 2019. As the world recovers from the pandemic, emissions are expected to rise further unless critical steps are taken to shift economies towards carbon neutrality.

Notwithstanding a global pandemic, countries are advancing climate action, with a focus on adaptation The voluntary efforts countries are making to reduce national emissions and adapt to the impacts of climate change are described in their nationally determined contributions (NDCs). Each Party to the Paris Agreement is requested to prepare, communicate and maintain successive NDCs that it intends to achieve. As of May 2021, 192 Parties had submitted their first NDCs to the Framework Convention on Climate Change secretariat. Moreover, as of December 2020, 48 of them were submitted as new or updated NDCs, representing 75 Parties and accounting for 30 per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions in 2017. Adaptation information was included in 39 of these 48 new or updated NDCs. Countries are articulating more quantified targets and indicators for adaptation, and identifying links between adaptation, the Sustainable Development Goals and other frameworks. The highest-priority areas for adaptation identified in the NDCs are: food security and production, terrestrial and wetland ecosystems, freshwater resources, human health, and key economic sectors and services.

An increasing number of countries are also prioritizing the formulation and implementation of national adaptation plans to boost their efforts to adjust to a changing climate. These include building flood defences, setting up early warning systems for cyclones, or switching to droughtresistant crops. As of May 2021, 125 of 154 developing countries were in the process of formulating and implementing national adaptation plans, and 22 countries have submitted their plans to the Framework Convention on Climate Change secretariat. Developed countries are stepping up their efforts to provide technical guidance and support to LDCs – which are particularly vulnerable to the effects of climate change –to develop and carry out such plans.

Reference: https://unstats.un.org/sdgs/report/2021/

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[Theme 3] Disarmament and Peace

The world is still a long way from achieving the goal of peaceful, just and inclusive societies.

Hundreds of millions of people are living in fragile and conflict-affected States. At the end of 2020, about 1 per cent of the global population – 82.4 million people – had been forcibly displaced as a result of persecution, conflict or generalized violence. The COVID-19 pandemic has exposed and intensified inequality and discrimination. In fact, the crisis has created major disruptions in government functioning and has tested, weakened and sometimes even shattered countries’ systems of rights and protection. The pandemic is disproportionately affecting the most vulnerable worldwide, with children at high risk. Recovery from the crisis and sustainable development must be built on a foundation of peace, stability, respect for human rights, effective governance and the rule of law.

Widespread civilian deaths in armed conflicts persist, although progress has been made in most regions Armed conflict results in civilian deaths, injury and trauma, displacement and damaged essential infrastructure, including health care. It is associated with rampant violations of human rights and international humanitarian law, including against children. At least 176,095 civilian deaths were recorded in 12 of the world’s deadliest armed conflicts between 2015 and 2020. Despite this high toll, the annual number of civilian deaths globally actually decreased by 61 per cent over this period. However, in sub-Saharan Africa, civilian deaths in conflicts increased by 66 per cent. The reduction in civilian deaths at the global level is attributable to some of the deadliest conflicts becoming less lethal, along with collective efforts to enhance the protection of civilians.

In 2020, 5 civilians per 100,000 people were killed in armed conflicts, and 1 in 7 of those were women or children. Most civilian deaths were caused by small arms and light weapons (27 per cent) or by heavy weapons and explosive munitions (24 per cent). Throughout 2020, the United Nations has consistently called for a global ceasefire to protect civilians from the deadly combination of armed conflict and COVID-19.

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Topic 1 Can advanced technology become the key to overcome educational disparity during COVID-19?

COVID-19 has wiped out 20 years of education gains. It produced results that an additional 101 million or 9% of children in grades 1 through 8 fell below minimum reading proficiency levels in 2020 and participation in organized pre-primary learning increased from 65% in 2010 to 73% in 2019. Now, many young children are entirely reliant in caregivers at home. In doing so, slow progress in school completion is likely to get worse and basic school infrastructure to build back better is lacking in many countries.

To mitigate education inequality due to COVID-19, we could think of using advanced technology like online education platform as a solution. It has many advantages, for example eliminating the limitation of location, allowing cost-effective academic environment but there are also limitations to utilize it, because of high costs for introduction or lack of basic school infrastructure.

Reference: https://sdgs.un.org/goals/goal4

Affirmative

Negative

Anika Goel Ayul Seo Chaeni Lee Daine Hwang Đặng Hồng Hà Gia Ninh Đàm Hara Jang Hsueh-Jui Wang Joachim Joseph Ramirez Junehee Lee La Le Quynh Anh Lee Yun-Jen Maxine Angelica J. Dela Cruz Nyneishia Yogesh Thy Le Vu Quynh Yueun Park

Chaen Yoon Chalida Pitimontreekul Chau Vu Dahyeon Nam Franchesca Wyette Gaerlan Genill Marquisse Pullan Hyewon Jeon Juha Bae Louis Benedict Sison Mayuka Rajesh Parvani Akhilesh Riya V. Kaggal Thanadhol Sutapakdi Thao Nguyen Phuong Thuy Anh Nguyen Nguyen An Thy Trang Nguyen Yu-Chien Chang

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1st Affirmative Constructive Speech Speaker: Anika Goel, Maxine Angelica J. Dela Cruz, Daine Hwang

Anika Goel State Argument   

New normal leads to digital learning. Advanced technology offers teachers an efficient method to deliver their lessons to students.

Advanced technology allows students to attend classes from any location of their choice.

Online education is far more affordable as compared to physical learning.

Evidence   

Online learning includes resources such as videos, pdfs, podcasts, and teachers could use these tools as part of their lesson plans.

By extending the lesson plan beyond traditional textbooks to include online resources, teachers can become more efficient educators.

Lower overhead needed to operate online programs. Tuition tend to be lower, but many additional expenses, such as transportation costs and course materials, are eliminated in an online program.

Maxine Angelica J. Dela Cruz

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State Argument    

Modern technology allows a cost-effective academic environment.

Financial costs -transportation fees and commuting expenses, food in cafeterias, course materials, and real estate could be reduced.

Online classes save a lot of time – especially when you live far away from your institution.

Visual aids improve learners’ conceptual thinking and help educators to save time and make learning permanent.

Evidence 

Research in 2015 conducted on schools of Dera Ghazi Khan in Pakistan shows that 70% of teachers and students agree that visual aids help in motivation while 30% don’t. Also surveyed that there was a 68% increase in their vocabulary.

Daine Hwang

State Argument  

Sophisticated technology allows students around the world to have access to well-trained and professionally prepared teachers.

The COVID-19 outbreak was the trigger for providing affordable and effective online lectures to low-income students across the country.

Evidence  

In South Korea, schools located in Daejeon reported that 68% of students' grades went down. However, these grades bounced up to A and A plus by the help of ‘Engang’(인강) Gangnam online class was a way to bridge the educational gap.

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Cross-Examination by the Negative Team Side

Speaker

Q&A

Neg. Yu-Chien Chang

‘Engang’ from qualified teachers provides great education and its results were successful. However these lessons are often not public and require extra tuition fees. Students from poor districts cannot afford these types of education. Which means that these types of education are worsening education disparity. This clashes with the aims of SDGs goal 4, so how does the affirmative think about the adherence of SDGs 4 with utilizing ‘Engang’ amongst students?

Aff.

This might cause the educational disparity in the country. That's my idea. It's because the prices are far too bold. A lot of people now have access to this education. So I strongly believe that this will be the chance for our country South Korea to reduce the gap in education.

Instead of furthering the gap.

Daine Hwang

Neg. Yu-Chien Chang

⅔ of the world's school age children do not have sufficient technology at home to benefit online education according to UNICEF. (Time Up.)

1st Negative Constructive Speech Speaker: Chau Vu, Juha Bae, Trang Nguyen

Chau Vu

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State Argument 

Advanced technology may help the situation, but cannot be the key to overcoming education disparity during the pandemic. Not all students around the world have the privilege to have access to advanced technology.

Evidence 

According to the report of UNICEF in 2020, two-thirds of the world’s school-age children have no internet access at all to benefit from advanced technology. The report notes that the digital divide is perpetuating inequalities that already divide countries and communities.

Juha Bae State Argument 

The more severe the poverty rate in a country is, the less access to the internet they tend to display.

Evidence 



Statistics show that only 3% of Burundi population, one of the poorest countries with a poverty rate of 65% and ranking 185th out of 189 countries in the 2019 Human Development Index, have access to the internet. 14% for Afghanistan, 7% for Chad, and so on.

The lack of internet access in developing countries leads to another uneducated generation and as this continues, the situation will grow more and more irreversible.

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Trang Nguyen

State Argument 

For children and young people with no internet access, education can be out of reach and they are falling even further behind their peers.

Evidence 



 

There are above 8 hundred million students (about fifty per cent of learners) around the world lacked a household computer, and approximately 7 hundred million (about 43 per cent) lacked internet access, and 56 million were unable to use mobile phones to access information owing to limited coverage by mobile networks ,according to UNESCO in 2021.

The most vulnerable learners, online and distance education deepened existing social inequalities: about 40 percent of poorer countries did not provide specific support to disadvantaged learners during the COVID-19 crisis.

Only 5 percent of children and young people in West and Central Africa have internet access at home compared to the 33 per cent global average.

Differences are stark yet between rich and poor countries, with only 6 percent of children and young people in low-income countries having internet access compared to 87 per cent in high-income countries.

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Cross-Examination by the Affirmative Team Side

Speaker

Aff.

Gia Ninh Đàm

Q&A Lack of education does not mean that virtual education itself is not good. Yes or no?

Neg. Yu-Chien Chang

It is a problem that over 1.3 billion children do not have the access to that benefit.

Aff.

But many people encountering that problem does not mean that the technology devices are not a good solution to reduce the educational gap.

Gia Ninh Đàm

Neg. Yu-Chien Chang

However, we have to realize that those people who do not have internet connection and devices are mostly from the poorest background. People who already have these devices are devices that are already better off.

Those who are poor cannot afford the access and thus neglected, while the others are getting more advanced education. This means that the education gap will inevitably have to increase, which does not adhere to the SDG goals.

Aff.

How could you ensure that going to the offline school would address the problem?

Gia Ninh Đàm

Neg. Juha Bae

Our argument is that, if everything is online, disadvantages for the poor will increase. So this seems to be a whole different point. (Time Up)

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2nd Affirmative Constructive Speech Speaker: La Le Quynh Anh, Lee Yun-Jen, Nyneishia Yogesh

La Le Quynh Anh State Argument  

Advanced technology allows students to attend advanced classes and deepen their knowledge with experienced educators.

With the help of online learning (which was only made possible because of technology) students who want to study overseas do not have to worry about their location.

Evidence  

Through online education, students have reduced travel costs, and students from a distance can receive education more conveniently.

For international students, without the aid of advanced technology, these students would have had to enroll in other educational institutions in the region, which would not only disrupt their education, but also create other problems.

Lee Yun-Jen State Argument 

Online education can provide quality education.

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Evidence  

Some developing countries cannot afford an ipad or laptops but we can fund them to let them buy laptops and ipads.

We can also work in different ways to do homework, like google slides, PPT, google doc etc.

Nyneishia Yogesh State Argument 

Online classes decrease the risk of students getting COVID-19.

Evidence  

Online schooling does not require students to interact face to face as COVID-19 spreads through droplets.

Online schooling gave schools, teachers, and students an opportunity to learn during the challenging time.

Cross-Examination by the Negative Team Side

Speaker

Q&A

Neg. Dahyeon Nam

Second speaker mentioned that the teachers could give our materials to help the students. How that is different from the offline personalized classes?

Aff.

Students attending the class can do research while listening to the class.

Lee Yun Jen

Neg. Dahyeon Nam

But that can also be done in offline classes as well. So what is the difference between online or offline students?

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Aff.

Lee Yun Jen

The teacher can check the students at once, and the students are free and easy to do activities during class.

Neg. Dahyeon Nam

The first speaker said that she found the sources from google. Could you clarify the sources? It seems a little unreliable.

Aff.

Could you clarify?

Nyneishia Yogesh

Neg. Dahyeon Nam

You said you found the sources from google, but could you specify the sources you got the information from?

Aff.

I found the meaning of online school from google.

Nyneishia Yogesh

Neg. Dahyeon Nam

It is given that children of young age will need adult supervision to navigate through online platforms to effectively learn. Then how will the children of busy parents and/or guardians be able to access effective education?

Aff.

It is true that it is difficult to involve young students in class. However, with the development of technology, students can participate in classes without the help of parents, that is, without guardians. (Time Up)

Daine Hwang

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2nd Negative Constructive Speech Speaker: Thanadhol Sutapakdi, Parvani Akhilesh, Chaen Yoon

Thanadhol Sutapakdi State Argument 

Countries must first build the infrastructure first, and also acknowledge that socio economic background affects the probability of being a top performer in education.

Evidence 





Other countries are recovering from the pandemic, and the affirmative side mentioned a new normal. However, not all countries are prepared for this new normal. For instance, in Sub-Saharan countries in Africa, they are not used to most of the advanced technology.

Going to school physically will give us the opportunity to adapt to the new normal through social distancing and learning to use sanitary facilities. School is a place where students could unite through different methods such as wearing uniforms and both rich and poor are taught equally.

In some nations, basic school infrastructures were lacking even before the pandemic. So building the appropriate infrastructures comes first.

Parvani Akhilesh

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State Argument 

Not all students around the world have the privilege to have access to advanced technology.

And there are various advantages of offline school. Motivation to go to school and learn, making use of school infra in better ways, and we can participate in extracurricular activities.

Evidence 

Some activities need students to interact with each other. And school helps decrease education disparity through methods such as uniform making all rich and poor students to be in the same position.

Chaen Yoon State Argument 

More and more digitized classes are coming out. If this situation continues, there will be inequality for students who cannot take digitized classes and will not be able to learn in the great environment.

Evidence 

According to OECD, About 4 out of 10 highly educated adults participate in formal or onthe-job training, while about 8 of 10 people with low levels of education do not take part.

Workers with low skills are also less likely to participate in such training and more likely to work in sectors being transformed by automation and digitalisation, that is, in jobs where they will need to develop new skills now and in the future.

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Cross-Examination by the Affirmative Team Side Aff.

Speaker Ayul Seo

Q&A The first speaker was unclear. Could you summarize what you were trying to say?

Neg. Thanadhol Sutapakdi

Countries are still recovering from the pandemic, so not all funds could be used for education. So countries who are still in need of basic school infrastructure should first, use the money for infrastructure rather than using it to adopt advanced technology instantly.

Aff.

So do you still think that building schools will help the country to reduce education?

Daine Hwang

Neg. Thanadhol Sutapakdi

Some countries, some people do not have the knowledge to utilize advanced technology, thus we need time to learn so more people could have access to it.

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1st Negative Rebuttal Speech Speaker: Yu-Chien Chang, Chalida Pitmontreekul, Nguyen An Thy, Riya V. Kaggal

Yu-Chien Chang

Rebuttal 

The affirmative side’s first argument was “advanced technology provides the education platform eliminating the limitation of location,” and to some extent, this may be true.

However, this statement can be undermined with 3 main points.

1. Virtual education can never fulfill the rich benefits of field experience.

2. We cannot ignore the errors of technology.

3. Distractions prevent effective education using technology.

Evidence 





According to the research done by the Western Connecticut University, offline education enables students to benefit by developing professional identity, applying taught knowledge in practice, and better-demonstrating engagement to activities.

Disconnections of wifi or disability to utilize mic or camera has been preventing us from having smooth classes. Two thirds of the world’s school-age children do not have internet connection in their homes, according to a new joint report from UNICEF. If students are unable to connect to classes due to technological statuses, the whole point of being able to study from distant areas becomes completely meaningless.

According to the research conducted by Barnes & Noble College Insights on American college students, approximately over 60% of students feel unready and find it difficult to focus during online classes. No matter how convenient being able to study from far away is, if it does not provide effective learning conditions, we cannot consider that as actually providing students the effective education they need and deserve.

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Chalida Pitmontreekul Rebuttal 

Advanced technologies which could lead to an even stronger educational disparity. I strongly oppose the concept that advanced technology would destroy the limitation of location because not every region can utilize that technology, and the word “not every” leads to the disparity in education.

Evidence 



According to the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis, there are roughly half of the world’s population that cannot approach this beneficial network. A billion cannot even have access to electricity, the even more basic factor to digitalization.

Those who are eligible for the benefits have to have internet access first. Kids in the rural region are left out. Some even have to travel for miles to get into the place where the network is reached, which requires a lot of budgets for traveling and can sometimes be unaffordable.

Nguyen An Thy

Rebuttal 

Based on the points made by the opposing team, the main idea of the affirmative side’s first argument was “Advanced technology provides the education platform eliminating the limitation of location". However, this is a temporary solution to education equality.

Evidence   

Poor internet connection, lack of communication, technology issues could be addressed as the problems of online classes.

Teachers cannot keep track of all individuals effectively online.

Governments are unable to provide advanced tech and internet for every student.

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Riya V. Kaggal Rebuttal The 2nd argument of the negative side was “Advanced technology allows a cost-effective academic environment.” Maybe to some extent, having online classes allows a costeffective academic environment, but there are other aspects that we need to consider.

1. Punctuality and Responsibility 2. Interaction 3. Physical Activity and development Evidence 



Offline school allows students to punctually wake up, go to school, and be on time for classes. Students won’t effectively be able to interact with each other or with the teachers online. For example if there is a student who is quiet or shy, in offline school he or she eventually opens up. But whereas online, the student might turn off the camera and not interact at all. And when forced by the teacher to turn on the camera, the student might even start to lie, blaming an unstable network or disabled camera etc.

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1st Affirmative Rebuttal Speech Speaker: Hsueh-Jui Wang, Chaeni Lee, Hara Jang

Hsueh-Jui Wang Rebuttal 

School infrastructures do not adjust the disparity that exists under the current status quo.

Presumably, school infrastructures can alleviate educational inequalities.

Evidence  

The educational gap is caused by school closures. In other words, the infrastructure is not very important.

Overall, the focus on infrastructure is exposing these students to COVID, not rectifying the gap that currently exists. The positive side is not only providing these students with skills, but also reclaiming their schools and their rights.

Chaeni Lee Rebuttal 

Not all students around the world have the privilege to have access to advanced technology.

A lot of people are likely to focus more on projects that promise something like 'one educational tablet for all students', but that's not really the case.

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Evidence  

Given the fact that radio and television are still prevalent among students, arguing that not all people are accessible can only be considered as an excuse.

You can even reach many learners at once using one device. As part of some projects, a classroom of up to 50 students can 'operate' independently of a single computer as long as each has their own mouse. In this sense, the problem of people's inability to buy cheaply or access advanced technology can be alleviated rather simply.

Hara Jang Rebuttal  

In order for something to develop, we have to pay the price.

The opposing side is focusing on “What we’ll cost,” but the affirmative side focuses on “How incredibly advantageous we would be” to apply this great technology in education.

Evidence   

Any modality has its own pros and cons. So, when the solution doesn’t serve the benefit of all does not mean it’s not the best solution.

In this digitalization era, no internet means fewer opportunities.

The whole world is wrapped on the internet, no internet equal being isolated to the development of humanity and might affect the whole future generation.

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2nd Negative Rebuttal Speech Speaker: Thao Nguyen Phuong, Louis Benedict Sison, Riya V. Kaggal, Yu-Chien Chang

Thao Nguyen Phuong Rebuttal 

The affirmative side’s second argument was “Advanced technology allows a costeffective academic environment.” But for which party would advance technology enable a cost effective Academic learning environment? Advanced technology may not be costeffective to the parents and students who need to be supported to have a decent education during the pandemic.

Evidence 



Parents will have to ensure monthly high speed internet connection and technology devices.

The devices will need to be constantly updated to the latest soft/hardware versions to meet with the latest technological requirements for an online learning effective experience.

61 percent of children ages 3 to 18 have internet access at home. 39 percent don’t have access to the internet at home.

Louis Benedict Sison Rebuttal 

Given the current circumstances of the international community, it will be much harder to prioritize technological advancement over the well-being of humanity. Cost-effectiveness won’t always equate to efficiency.

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Evidence 



In a study by the Social Weather Stations (SWS), 4 out of 10 Filipino students are not able to attend classes because they do not have access to devices needed for distance learning.

This in itself is a challenge because a smartphone is the most basic thing you’ll have to have in our current era of technology, but some people don’t even have one.

There are a lot of developing countries that are not able to match the pace of advancement of other top-performing countries in terms of technology. This is simply because even if they do apply advancements to their technology, as a third world country, the unprivileged will have to make investments on these new technologies which to some is still, impossible.

Riya V. Kaggal Rebuttal 

The affirmative team’s third argument was ‘advanced technology enables access to well trained and professionally qualified teachers around the world.’ On the surface, the idea of access to well-trained and professionally qualified teachers seems right and can help, however, there are several other nuances that come into play to ensure effective learning for students.

1. Time zone differences 2. Language 3. Differences between the countries

Evidence 



Even though well qualified teachers may be available, the time zone differences can make it challenging. It may be too early or too late in the day, for either the student or the teacher.

Not all the students from around the world are comfortable with the idea of learning in English, a large percentage of children prefer to learn in their mother tongue. Even for those who understand the English language, they may not be able to understand because the teacher might have a different accent. There may be cultural differences, differences

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in curriculum and the method of interacting, engaging with and teaching the children which may hinder effective teaching. For example, a child in India from the rural area may not be very open with the teachers.

Yu-Chien Chang Rebuttal 

The third argument “advanced technology enables access to well-trained and professionally qualified teachers around the world” focuses on the benefit that students are able to connect with well-trained teachers. However, this doesn’t mean that all of the teachers are doing an excelling job, or even the minimum of what their duties require.

Evidence 



According to the Korean news media, Donga News, students and parents have been experiencing the habit of school teachers during virtual lessons of being somewhat lazy.

It has been observed that teachers often reused educational materials from already existing or outdated sources instead of preparing their own to best suit their students, or even replacing their lessons as a whole with educational videos filmed by other teachers.

The current behavior of public school teachers indirectly encourages private tutoring in order for students to better gain knowledge on topics the public school teachers were supposed to teach, and this would inevitably lead to educational inequality.

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2nd Affirmative Rebuttal Speech Speaker: La Le Quynh Anh, Junehee Lee, Joachim Joseph Ramirez

La Le Quynh Anh Rebuttal 

Many organizations and governments are now helping underprivileged children who do not have the skills, and this action can bridge the educational gap.

Evidence 

Stanford students started a non-profit organization that donates computers to Vietnamese children and Vietnam. The Vietnamese government also provided 1 million computers for students. People will be interested in this, donate and help children who don't currently have the skills to have a device. So they can access online learning. So we believe this won't be a long term problem.

Junehee Lee Rebuttal 

Building basic infrastructures will not help solve the education disparity in COVID-19 technology.

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Evidence   

Given the circumstances, it is not effective at all to build basic infrastructures and it will not help solve the education disparity in COVID-19.

Even when a large number of students had infrastructures to be educated in person, because of COVID-19, most education materials were replaced to be e-based.

Technology would not only pull them out of risk from COVID-19 but also give them an opportunity for education.

Joachim Joseph Ramirez

Rebuttal 

According to the negative side, the use of advanced technologies is not the best way of tackling the problem of educational disparity. This argument, however, fails to consider other factors of educational disparity that people have faced during the pandemic. Online education is needed to support the families of the millions of people who have lost their jobs due to the coronavirus.

Evidence 



Many people around the world have lost their jobs, and many children are forced to support their families. Because of their situations, the rigorous time-constraints and attendance requirements of traditional education might be too much for them to handle.

It is these people that advanced technology aims to assist. Advanced technology eliminates the need for a place of meeting, and minimizes the costs of learning, all while providing a high-quality education.

Online training with advanced technology eliminates the need for meeting places and minimizes learning costs while providing high-quality training.

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Topic 2

Is Carbon Taxation the most efficient way to advance decarbonization efforts?

The rise in global temperatures and the resultant climate change are now at the center stage of public policy debates. Governments, businesses and communities are pledging to take action to reduce emissions. One of the popular policy options to reduce carbon emissions is implementing carbon taxes. A carbon tax is a fee that fossil fuel burning corporations pay as a result of government regulations. The main objective of a carbon tax is to mirror the actual cost that burning carbon creates. Carbon taxes ensure corporations and consumers pay for the external costs they inflict on the wider society. It helps everyone to receive a guaranteed return by setting a definite price on carbon and encouraging innovation to avoid the expenses of a carbon tax. However, there are some problems like burdening the underprivileged who cannot afford sustainable energy or targeting the consumers to pay the tax, not polluters.

Reference: https://www.ey.com/en_in/tax/india-tax-insights/can-a-carbon-tax-drive-decarbonization-andsustainability-agenda

Affirmative

Negative

An Lý Arya V. Kaggal Frances Summer Dale Dy Kazandra Alexis Morallos Manato Iizuka Seoyeon Choi Sippakorn Wongsaming Yewon Park

Chanida Sangchuan Dayoung Lee Jisun Hwang Kayeon Park Pham Tran Bao Chau Sooa Cho

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1st Affirmative Constructive Speech Speaker: Kazandra Alexis Morallos, Arya V. Kaggal

Kazandra Alexis Morallos State Argument 

Carbon tax encourages positive lifestyle changes. Carbon tax can assign the burden of responsibility to each user.

Evidence 

   

By raising the cost and making carbon-intensive goods and services more expensive, it influences consumers to lessen utilizing these products or shift to lower-carbon alternatives, because they are cheaper.

In the UK, about 30% of a household carbon footprint comes from food.

In the Philippines, there is an excise tax on plastic bags in supermarkets, stores, and sales outlets.

Carbon Tax is a type of Peruvian tax that addresses externality and requires people to pay the social cost which in return, lessens excess consumption on the free market.

Carbon tax can be a progressive source of revenue for developing countries.

Arya V. Kaggal

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State Argument 

Carbon tax encourages the development of alternative energy sources.

Evidence 



Carbon Tax encourages the development of alternative energy sources because people may find the carbon tax too costly or some may find it a waste of their money so they avoid carbon tax by starting to use any renewable energy.

After a long time there would be a lot of money collected and that money could be distributed back among the people who paid carbon tax so they can install solar panels or wind turbines in or out of their houses to provide energy.

1st Negative Constructive Speech Speaker: Dayoung Lee, Sooa Cho

Dayoung Lee State Argument 

The reduction of CO2 is small.

Evidence  

According to Report by the Climate Accountability Institute, 100 companies are responsible for 71% of global emissions.

Four among five countries that implemented carbon tax could reduce the rate of growth of emissions by 0.5-1.7%. (Gilbert E. Metcalf, Tufts University)

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Sooa Cho

State Argument 

Carbon taxation focuses only on consumption.

Evidence  

Consumers pay the final cost instead of the actual producers. For example, residents in Canada pay $1,000 each year for the carbon tax.

A lot of necessities such as clothing, furniture, plastic and household machines are made from carbon. As a result, it negatively affects the poor.

2nd Affirmative Constructive Speech Speaker: Yewon Park, Seoyeon Choi

Yewon Park State Argument 

Carbon tax can generate of revenues for local governments.

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Evidence  Economic effect of the carbon tax introduced through the general equilibrium model impedes short-term GDP growth, but shows that it is a long-term policy tool that significantly increases GDP in the long run.

Seoyeon Choi State Argument 

Carbon tax encourages technological innovation.

Evidence  In Finland in 2012, the price of diesel without tax was about 79 dollars and 74 dollars of tax was added resulting in the price of diesel to be about 153 dollars. On the other hand, gasoline had more tax added. The price of gasoline without tax was about 72 dollars which is cheaper than diesel, but 93 dollars of tax was added resulting the price of diesel to be about 165 dollars. This shift in people’s preference because of carbon tax would have influenced the companies and factories that produce cars to develop more cars with eco-friendly features, so the consumers feel less burden on fuel price.

2nd Negative Constructive Speech Speaker: Chanida Sangchuan, Jisun Hwang

Chanida Sangchuan

45

State Argument 

Carbon taxation hurts developing countries.

Evidence  

Everything is carried out with a single purpose called ‘national interest’.

Those countries that are really affected are the undeveloped countries with financial difficulties who still have a problem with the level of their daily living, are vulnerable to the effect of national disaster, and have limited budget and capacity.

Jisun Hwang State Argument 

There are other possible alternatives.

Evidence 

 



According to the IMF and the International Energy Agency Calculation, pre-tax and posttax fossil fuel subsidies are approximately a hundred and ninety-six billion dollars and five-point two trillion dollars total. However on the other hand global revenue energy subsidies are only one hundred and forty billion dollars in to.

According to the IMF, China is spending staggering 4 billion dollars in order to motivate their citizens to consume fossil fuels in 2016 alone.

In Canada, where the government collects carbon tax for environmental purposes, the government stacked money into their financial budget and used it to bribe citizens and car buyers for more consumption.

Providing incentives instead of punishment and a carbon cap is a more efficient way because it is greener and limits the emission.

46

1st Negative Rebuttal Speech Speaker: Kayeon Park, Manato Iizuka

Kayeon Park, Manato Iizuka Rebuttal 

No one can guarantee that carbon tax is going to be used for environmental purposes and encourage positive lifestyle changes.

Evidence 

 

Ideally, as decarbonization progresses, the amount of carbon taxes collected should decrease, but if the money collected from the carbon tax is spent on non-environmental policies, it becomes money that is both collected and needed.

Positive lifestyle change is only possible when revenue from carbon taxation is earmarked for environment policy.

While carbon tax is a cost to us, a zero-carbon lifestyle also requires effort and costs.

Since there are more expenditures either way, it is thought that many people will choose not to change their lifestyle because it is more convenient not to change their lifestyle.

 1st Affirmative Rebuttal Speech Speaker: Frances Summer Dale Dy

Frances Summer Dale Dy

47

Rebuttal 

Burden of taxation is determined by governing communities: upstream

Evidence 

In the analysis by Richard Heede of Climate Accountability Institute, eight of the 20 carbon-intensive firms are investor-owned, and 12 are state-owned. Some of these eight companies are Chevron, Exxon, BP and Shell. These firms have contributed a total of 35% carbon-related and methane emission to the planet since 1965. Such a report (spanning from 1965 to 2017) is impactful in deciding at which point will the taxes be levied and a correct answer is an upstream taxation where these multinational companies belong.

2nd Negative Rebuttal Speech Speaker: Jisun Hwang

Jisun Hwang Rebuttal 

Carbon taxation and technological innovations are not mutually exclusive and rather burdens the underprivileged.

Evidence 



To achieve Paris Agreement goals, we need forty dollars to eighty dollars of carbon tax implemented in every industry. However, the current price of carbon tax in these countries is actually only between two dollars which is significantly low and not even enough to achieve the goal of carbon taxation.

There were protests against carbon taxation in France, Mexico, Iran, Ecuador, Brazil and Chile which indicate strong public disagreement.

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



According to research, seventy four percent of carbon tax revenues in high income OECD countries go directly to the general revenues for the government. Only twelve percent of the carbon tax collected will be directly used for environmental purposes.

The effect of carbon taxation is very limited upon the poor because they are more affected by rise in costs and prices.

2nd Affirmative Rebuttal Speech Speaker: An Lý, Sippakorn Wongsaming

An Lý, Sippakorn Wongsaming Rebuttal 

Carbon taxation does help the local country to gain plenty of revenues to the local country and the government may use it to develop their country.

Evidence 

Governments solve it by investing in other types of energy such as hydro energy and wind energy or even solar cells that will help lower the Carbon of those countries.



They solve it by investing in other types of energy such as hydro energy and wind energy or even solar cells that'll help lower the Carbon of those countries. As seen with the Swedish government, which utilizes the simple method of allocating “General budget funds… for specific purposes linked to the carbon tax, such as addressing undesirable distributional consequences of taxation or financing other climate-related measures.” and Carbon Taxes and CO2 Emissions: Sweden as a Case Study." American Economic Journal: Economic Policy has reported a reduction in the emissions levels of Sweden by nearly 11% after its implementation.

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Topic 3

Do we need to be armed for national security?

National security refers to the security and defense of a sovereign state, including its citizens, economy, and institutions, which is regarded as a duty of government. There are some arguments that national security is needed or not. Based on history, national security was needed because the countries which had military power have survived and peace has been protected by military power. However, at the same time, arming ourselves led to more war than peace and total peace could not be achieved by simply arming ourselves.

Affirmative

Negative

Geon Hyeon Kim Hoang Hoa Tue Giang Hyeseong Ju (Kyle) Hyungeon (Andrew) Chung Mai Nam Anh Nguyễn Đỗ Thảo Anh Nhật Anh Trang Nguyễn Trần Nam Sơn Tuan Tran Yunseong Kim

Donghwan Yi Giang Hà Heejae Jeong Juseok Oh Naphatjutha Rajatabhothi Nick Woohyuk Choi Seungwoo Baik Thanet Reantongcome Thanh Thảo Phan

50

1st Affirmative Constructive Speech Speaker: Trần Nam Sơn, Nhật Anh Trang Nguyễn

Trần Nam Sơn State Argument 

Being armed is necessary because it gives the country itself a form of safety.

Evidence  

Countries are just a bigger version of tribes. Countries never trust other countries completely, making it harder to give up the weapons.

Humans are clearly still influenced by animals’ instinct of living in groups. As long as we are human, we will need weapons to shelter us from fear.

Nhật Anh Trang Nguyễn State Argument 

How being armed protects countries from being invaded.

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Evidence 



History proves that the country which has military power survives. Ottoman has a powerful and organized military. Mongo Empire was also the largest empire from 1206 to 1638. The main reason that they succeeded to prosper was the military power.

Three decades ago, Ukraine was briefly the 3rd-biggest nuclear power. But they gave up and looked at what happened to Ukraine.

Cross-Examination by the Negative Team

Side

Speaker

Q&A

Neg. Giang Hà

We would like to point out the example of Canada and the United States. Canadians fully trust the United States so they don’t have a lot of energy and manpower or economic diversity to be armed. They are long-time allies and they haven’t fought each other. We are stating that states of neutrality like Finland or Switzerland are widely accepted around the world. The UK and France are in a long-term rivalry but they shook hands and walked together. They have a constructive relationship. The bride built between both countries proves it.

Neg. Heejae Jeong

Why offensive weapons like atomic bomb can be justified.

Is North Korea doing this to protect their national security or threatening? If you guys disagree with North Korea’s action, what’s the deciding factor that ‘this nation is using arm force to protect or threatening peace?’

Aff.

A. The reason that other countries are armed is because of countries who are not really following the rules in global society. To make defense against them, we should have a defensive system for every country.

Geon hyeon Kim

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1st Negative Constructive Speech Speaker: Juseok Oh

Juseok Oh

State Argument 

Gradual disarmament of nations is necessary.

Evidence 

  

Armament can be defined as weaponry used as means of offense by nations like atomic bomb and white false atomic bomb. Under global consensus, disarmament will be carried out slowly but clearly and it will be a step toward the world where no more lives are sacrificed by international conflicts.

The benefits of disarmament are tremendous.

Humanity’s weapons are so destructive that if another war occurs on a global scale, civilization itself may regress in time.

Needs to harm other territory like nuclear bomb fall into the category that we should abandon but it does not mean we are dropping defensive system altogether.

Cross-Examination by the Affirmative Team Side

Speaker

Aff.

Nguyễn Đỗ Thảo Anh

Q&A I’d like to ask that a lot of conflicts happen not because countries declare war on each other but because the people inside the country are really dismayed with the system of government.

If we are not armed, how do you suggest solving the problem and preventing human’s suffering and the subversion of government?

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Neg. Juseok Oh

Aff.

Nguyễn Đỗ Thảo Anh

Neg. Juseok Oh

Aff.

Nguyễn Đỗ Thảo Anh

As I mentioned, top priority is to reduce casualties and solve things in a peaceful manner. We are arguing for the reduction of arms not the total elimination of weapons.

So we are saying that arm is still necessary for security?

I am saying that we need to disarm the tools of offense such as nuclear bomb, atomic bomb which are very violent bombs that can greatly give pain to people.

Do you think that we need to eliminate some weapons for defense but they can still harm others which are not as destructive as missiles?

Neg. Donghwan Yi Internal problem is more of an inside a country not an international security thing.

Aff.

Nguyễn Đỗ Thảo Anh

I think we are talking of national security which means we are talking about the safety of a country including economy, citizens, and institutions.

Neg. Donghwan Yi Does that mean not only disarming the government but also private people and citizens?

Aff.

Nguyễn Đỗ Thảo Anh

I was saying that in such cases, we still need weapons to defend or to quell the rebellions and therefore create a separate environment to live in.

Neg. Donghwan Yi Obviously the terrorism and extremist are problem. But warfare is not the causing problem. Pointing your guns to the citizens is wrong and there are other ways that are economically crippling by limiting trade?

Aff.

Nguyễn Đỗ Thảo Anh

But the thing is the people of the country. They are not a nation, responsible for that much. People or economy are just responsible for themselves and therefore it is much harder to do that without arms.

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2nd Affirmative Constructive Speech Speaker: Hyungeon (Andrew) Chung, Hoang Hoa Tue Giang

Hyungeon (Andrew) Chung State Argument 

How being armed can actually ensure peace.

Evidence  

The intervention of the UN's peacekeeping force has been prominent, therefore proving being armed is a way to ensure peace.

When World War 2 began, Belgium lost their neutralization status when Switzerland could maintain the neutralization status. Many experts say that the big difference was because of military power.

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Hoang Hoa Tue Giang State Argument 

How, by being armed, our countries can be financially stronger.

Evidence 



As military full protection, a country is able to develop immensely regardless of global issues such as war, nuclear threat, terrorism is able to develop. A big pocket of money and resources could buy or save up resources to stay alive and fuel the military forces and shelter the citizens.

To have peace, governments need to invest into the military and they need money, a lot of money to build a strong military force enough to threaten or warn others. To simplify, how strong a country's military is can be measured by their economy.

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Cross-Examination by the Negative Team Side

Speaker

Q&A

Neg. Seungwoo Baik

What’s the usage of the UN’s peacekeeping force?

Aff.

Hyeseong Ju (Kyle)

Peacekeepers need weapons in order to keep the peace of defending forces. Not every war or challenges should be depended on or relied on by the UN’s peacekeepers. Instead, peacekeepers are just supporters of that nation. Nation itself should have their most defensive forces to defend against attacks.

Neg. Naphatjutha Rajatabhothi

If we can talk it out, or peaceful negotiation, can we not defend before the problem arises? Or does making organizations effective to keep peace?

2nd Negative Constructive Speech Speaker: Thanh Thảo Phan

Thanh Thảo Phan

57

State Argument 

Disarmament can prevent diseases, global warming and also gives rights of peace.

Evidence   

There are many laws and agreements helping us more humane so that people maintain peace.

Uranium and Platinum, which is an ingredient of nuclear weapons, makes radiation. This can damage large areas of territory and people suffer from side effects.

World War II changed the landscape, crushing plants and animals.

Cross-Examination by the Affirmative Team Side

Speaker

Aff.

Hyeseong Ju (Kyle)

Q&A How would banning weapons or disarmament help a country to maintain long term peace when technologies and tools are being created on a daily basis?

How would disarmament be beneficial to national security if weapons are eventually made again after disarmament?

Neg. Thanh Thảo Phan

Advanced technology depends on how we use it. Gatling guns are made to protect but it became worse. Laws and agreements can guarantee safety.

Aff.

Hyeseong Ju (Kyle)

Is there a difference between offensive and defensive weapons?

Neg. Thanh Thảo Phan

Offensive is to attack other countries and defensive is to defend those actions.

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1st Negative Rebuttal Speech Speaker: Nick Woohyuk Choi, Thanet Reantongcome

Nick Woohyuk Choi Rebuttal 

Peace doesn’t need force.

Evidence   

Organizations like the UN emerged and humanity developed. Through this, injustice can be resolved by the organization.

Armament doesn’t allow people to fulfill people’s selfishness.

Nations between countries are polarized because of various reasons. Even they are armed, they need strong country’s power to protect.

Thanet Reantongcome Rebuttal 

History proves that the military makes problems.

Evidence   

In modern times, the military is not the only element that maintains a country.

Disarmament can lead to focusing on economy.

Invented weapons will threaten people’s safety not keeping peace.

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1st Affirmative Rebuttal Speech Speaker: Mai Nam Anh, Yunseong Kim

Mai Nam Anh Rebuttal 

Total peace cannot be achieved by simply arming ourselves.

Evidence   

Peace is a concept of societal friendship and harmony in the absence of hostility and violence.

Peace is a time of period when we are free from civil disturbance and peace is a state or period of mutual concord between governments.

The reason we cannot achieve total peace is first, difference in religion and belief, the differences in countries, originality, race, ethnicities, the difference in economic status and in talents, education.

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Yunseong Kim Rebuttal 

Total peace cannot be achieved by simply arming ourselves.

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Evidence 



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There is this so-called “New Era of Conflict” which includes the entrenched conflict, nuclear threats. Unresolved regional tensions, absent or co-opted state institutions, illicit economic gain and scarcity of resources are the dominant drivers of conflict.

Nuclear weapons pose an ever-greater threat to the survival of humanity. Total elimination of nuclear weapons can still be achieved, but it will require a renewed commitment to trust and cooperation between the world's most powerful countries.

With the rates of violence between countries worldwide, it is impossible to achieve world peace without protecting ourselves.

2nd Negative Rebuttal Speech Speaker: Donghwan Yi

Donghwan Yi Rebuttal 

Military power should not be thought of as a power of the country.

Evidence   

Weapons only calls a tension to bloodshed happens.

All countries are equal regardless of military power.

The military is just a portion of prosperity. The main reason is related to economic power.

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2nd Affirmative Rebuttal Speech Speaker: Tuan Tran, Geon Hyeon Kim

Tuan Tran Rebuttal 

Connections between countries doesn’t mean that weapons are not necessary.

Evidence 

As we are humans, and think differently, innovatively and this can cause conflicts between people. However, others think that this form of government lacks human natural rights and democracy is their choice.

Wars result from tensions between groups of people that have something that opposes each other, and regardless of armed forces or not, they can still happen.

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Geon Hyeon Kim Rebuttal 

There is no clear standard of dividing offensive weapons and defensive weapons.

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Evidence  

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Weapons cannot have only one role. If there is a nuclear weapon, it can be used as offensive or defensive.

To nearly all countries, armaments are purely meant for the defense of the country and its citizens from any other forces that might appear in the future. We can say that armament is necessary in our society to defend and to make our country stronger.

The reason why Ukraine still remains is that they have strong armament. They are protecting their capital until now.

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MIDDLE SCHOOL TRACK Team A Participant: Đặng Hồng Hà , Riya V. Kaggal, Thanadhol Sutapakdi, Thuy Anh Nguyen, Nguyen An Thy, Yueun Park, Lee Yun-Jen, Thy Le Vu Quynh, Ayul Seo, Anika Goel, Chau Vu, Dayoung Lee, Genill Marquisse Pullan, Kayeon Park, Yewon Park, Sippakorn Wongsaming

Topic: COVID-19 and Children’s Rights Resolution: 1. RECOGNIZES the contexts in which children are exploited and abused; 2. ENCOURAGES family member to develop self-control; 3. DRAWS the attention to the causes of child abuse and solve the causes; 4. CALLS UPON child protection organizations, professional family counselor etc. to prevent unfortunate cases of child abuse; 5. EMPHASIZES the seriousness of children’s health and safety; 6. CONDEMNS governments that fail to legislate comprehensively or act decisively against child labour and employers who exploit children to increase profits; 7. ACKNOWLEDGES the Convention of the Rights of the Child which protect children from abuse, child labour, and things that interfere with the child’s education, etc.; 8. ENCOURAGES government/people to fund money for developing countries to provide better education for kids; 9. SUPPORTS educators to introduce new methods which can help children to get educated equally; 10. DESIGNATES an institution to set up and supply educational data/material that worldwide nations have access to; 11. FURTHER REMINDS the importance of global education for all children and make sure education is sustainable; 12. RECOMMENDS the implementation of annual medical check-up for children including mental health check;

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13. FURTHER REQUESTS the government's and society's active involvement in solving the causes of children’s mental health issues and the consequences of these causes; 14. ENCOURAGES schools to provide counseling and advisors to check up on students’ mental health; 15. EMPHASIZES children and adolescents to identify COVID 19-symptoms; 16. DEMANDS the government to provide appropriate nutrition in quantity and quality for children; 17. STRONGLY ENCOURAGES strengthen hygiene and sanitation conditions at the center;

Team B Participants: La Le Quynh Anh, Hyeseong Ju (Kyle), Nyneishia Yogesh, Yunseong Kim, Hara Jang, Hoang Hoa Tue Giang, Hyungeon (Andrew) Chung, Sunaina Prashanth, Mai Nam Anh, Geon Hyeon Kim, Hsueh-Jui Wang, Pham Tran Bao Chau

Topic: COVID-19 and Children’s Rights Resolution: 1. URGES every nation to comply with the United Nations Convention on Consent to Marriage, Minimum Age for Marriage, and Registration of Marriages, a treaty agreed upon in the United Nations on the standards of marriage, to completely abolish the forced marriage of young girls worldwide by 2030; 2. ENFORCES laws protecting girls; 3. ADVISES educating families about sexual and reproductive health; 4. EMPHASIZES the consent and will of men and women alike before marriage; 5. CALLS UPON all individuals to shed light and fight for women’s rights to hinder the problem of child marriage from perpetuating; 6. ENCOURAGES girls to get an education; 7. ADVISES girls around the world, especially those from developing countries and poverty-stricken areas, to courageously fight for their rights;

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8. CONDEMNS child marriage that is caused by but not limited to cultural and religious reasons; 9. PROVIDES economic support to girls and their families; 10. RECOGNIZES that all students should be provided with equal educational opportunities, with no discrimination; 11. UNDERLINES that all students are equal and should not be separated by gender, origin, or social class; 12. ACKNOWLEDGES that education has a direct impact on the reduction of poverty, and its importance on ending the poverty cycle families may face; 13. REQUESTS countries to advocate for and ameliorate the inequalities existing within education; 14. URGES citizens, organizations, and the governments to take immediate actions in times of COVID-19 to decrease the educational gap; 15. ENCOURAGES people to treat others with equality, regardless of but not limited to race and gender; 16. DECLARES that all schools should not allow any discrimination in any form, if anyone does discriminate they will have to reflect; 17. INFLUENCES cultural norms that support early marriage; 18. ENFORCING universal laws for Children’s Rights to Education; 19. RECOMMENDS providing an equal opportunity to all students; 20. RECOGNIZES childhood, dignity, and potential being derived from children around the world due to child labor; 21. EMPHASIZES the prohibition of enslaving children, forcing the production of child pornography, and requiring youngsters to work in hazardous environments; 22. URGES committees from different countries support and protect orphans, poor children, and kids going through child abuse; 23. RECOGNIZES the main victim of sexual and domestic abuse are mostly women; 24. UNDERLINES the laws and punishment for sexual and domestic abusers; 25. STRONGLY ENCOURAGES victims to stand up for themselves and break off from toxic, abusive relationships and family households;

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26. ACKNOWLEDGES the victims, do not blame them but instead support them; 27. REMINDS the sexual and domestic abusers that they will be punished for what they have done; 28. ENFORCES laws against abusers of women and children; 29. DESIGNATES the right protocols in places like ongoing COVID-19 testing, mask mandates, and infrastructure updates; 30. ENCOURAGES vaccinating children with invaluable support from COVAX (COVID19 Vaccine Global Access Facility) and the international community; 31. ENCOURAGES affected countries can partner with public television and radio channels to offer free educational material for and develop a platform that distributes free online learning resources to which low-income families can access without consuming their mobile data; 32. CALLS FOR the help of the governments in affected countries should make use of social protection programs like in-kind transfers that grant education related-fees (tuition fees, educational supplies) and school meals for children, especially among the most disadvantaged to lessen the inequality in becoming educated; 33. FURTHER PROCLAIMS education is the long-term solution for economic recovery and education is the global public good that needs to be prioritized; 34. EMPHASIZES developing and less developed nations should try not to cut their education expenses as the limited public finance to achieve short-term goals at the expense of long-term prosperity of the educated population because human capital is the key to combat poverty and enhancing economic productivity;

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HIGH SCHOOL TRACK Team A Participant: Juha Bae, Maxine Angelica J. Dela Cruz, Juseok Oh, Seoyeon Choi, Donghwan Yi, Yuchien Chang, Thanh Thảo Phan, Thao Nguyen Phuong, Thanet Reantongcome, Trang Nguyen, Gia Ninh Đàm

Topic: Fair Vaccine Distribution and Global Governance Resolution: 1. EMPHASIZES the reinforcement of COVAX to ensure fair distribution of vaccines, prevent vaccine nationalism demonstrated in MEDCs, provide vaccine facilities for safe vaccine perseverance; 2. REQUESTS for the expansion the COVAX’s authority to enable prevention of blockage or theft with vaccines; 3. ENCOURAGES promotion of vaccination and vaccine safety education targeted towards resistance; 4. ENCOURAGES population such as but not limited to medical staff, senior citizens, frontline workers, and uniformed personnel to be prioritized of COVID-19 vaccination; 5. INTRODUCES new programs to bring vaccines closer to vulnerable communities; 6. STRONGLY CONDEMNS illegal dealing and smuggling of vaccines; 7. ADOPTS partnerships and collaborations between corporations to ethically invest funds; 8. SUGGESTS a reliable organization to utilize social media to inform correct information about COVID-19 and vaccines and refute false information on the internet; 9. STRESSES the need to provide proper unbiased education and information on COVID19 vaccines; 10. ENCOURAGES for the right of people, regardless of age, to be vaccinated according to their will; 11. SUPPORTS the construction of infrastructure to support vaccine distribution, transportation, and storage;

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12. ENCOURAGES schools and government to work together to develop a system that will help with health checkup before getting the vaccine; 13. RECOGNIZES the fault in the vaccine distribution system, including demonstrations of vaccine nationalism and vaccine blockage; 14. FURTHER RECOMMENDS that the Government has increased propaganda and education on virus prevention measures. Raise public awareness about the effects of vaccines, so people will understand and not be too strict and put pressure on the authorities. From there, the vaccine will be delivered to the most urgent places; 15. CONDEMNS any discriminatory measures between people who are vaccinated and people who are not; 16. DEMANDS individual governments and organizations to stop sabotaging others’ portions of vaccines just because they are not in favor of them; 17. FURTHER REQUESTS that an international fund for vaccine be created and divided equally, then countries should repay each other (Countries not in a crisis should help those who are); 18. INSTRUCTS locals and authorities on proper vaccine storage and transportation; 19. URGES United Nations to take measures against governments and organizations that are illegally re-distributing the vaccines; 20. REQUESTS the United Nations to stop governments and organizations from shipping vaccines certain days before expiration to another country or organizations; 21. AUTHORIZES COVAX to make policies to require governments to dispose of expired vaccines in a safe way that would not hinder the local environment; 22. CONDEMNS the governments of developed countries of shipping near-expired vaccines to developing countries under the nominal of donation; 23. STRESSES vaccine-producing companies to stop from manufacturing too many vaccines in order to decrease the vaccines that are disposed of; 24. ENCOURAGES that people should invest in vaccine storage rather than the amount of vaccine in order for them to be stored for longer;

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Team B Participant: Jisun Hwang, Junehee Lee, Franchesca Wyette Gaerlan, Louis Benedict Sison, Kazandra Alexis Morallos, Sooa Cho, An Lý, Hà Trường Giang, Chalida Pitimontreekul, Heejae Jeong, Trần Nam Sơn, Nick Woohyuk Choi, Chaen Yoon

Topic: Fair Vaccine Distribution and Global Governance Resolution: 1. RECOGNIZES the urgent necessity of international cooperation for equal vaccine distribution; 2. REAFFIRMS the development of public infrastructure for Vaccine Transportation and Storage; 3. REGRETS the late and weak international guidelines provided for COVID-19 Vaccine redistribution; 4. CALLS UPON all nations’ active participation in aligning local medical policies according to global guidelines; 5. EMPHASIZES the crucial need for cooperation on both a macro- and microscale by a. Promoting more global alliances similar to the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunizations (GAVI); b. National and Local governments should strive for a more organized effort in instilling and ensuring safety for their citizens; 6. TRUSTS the Fair Allocation Framework developed by World Health Organization (WHO); 7. ALSO URGES vaccine-manufacturing nations to stop the monopolization of vaccines; 8. ACCEPTS the doubts and understand mistrust about COVID-19 and its vaccines; 9. ENCOURAGES wealthier nations to share vaccines and take decisive actions accordingly in order to distribute vaccines to more desperately needed regions; 10. STRONGLY ADVISES that every nation ought to assist economically unstable sovereign states and regions by a. Sending financial aid and medical supplies to developing nations that are unable to provide for themselves;

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b. Providing experts to help distribute vaccines at places with underdeveloped infrastructures; 11. STRONGLY ENCOURAGES vaccine producing countries to allow the free crossborder flow of finished vaccines and raw materials and share their know-how more rapidly; 12. STRONGLY ADVISES the united effort of improving public infrastructure for vaccine transportation and storage by a. Sending aid, experts and manpower to help the region create durable and effective infrastructures that can support vaccine and medical deliveries; b. Sharing Vaccine transportation and Storage Technology; 13. ENDORSES the transfer of finalized vaccine materials, facilities, and know-hows to other developing nations; 14. CALLS UPON nations to prioritize and fulfill COVAX contracts as a matter of emergency; 15. INVITES the establishment of a stronger UN central committee for vaccine distribution and dealing with similar crises; 16. UNDERSCORES the necessity for solidarity between member states and people groups by a. Forgiving past economic debts; b. Encouraging citizens to donate to more desperate regions; 17. DECLARES that the nations and parties amidst armed conflict are not exempted from the responsibility of compliance with relevant resolutions and acts of international cooperation in addition to autonomous domestic efforts for the fair and thorough distribution of COVID-19 vaccines, in accordance to the Geneva Conventions and their Additional Protocols;

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An Lý Vstarschool The possibility of restricting Global warming to 1.5 degree Celsius and below by 2030 As the COP 26 international conference drew to a conclusion, several environmental activists, including renowned ones such as Greta Thunberg and Vanessa Nakate, have expressed dissatisfaction and disappointment towards the results gained. The gathering was seen by most people as the “last best chance” our world has against the threat of climate change, with goals set out to limit the rise of temperature to 1.5°C and below by 2030.

However, the agreement reached at the end was considered to be less rigorous than originally expected, prompting us to ask the question of whether or not the ambitious environmental goal set out could be achieved. In my opinion, this could still be done, albeit with numerous challenges that take incredible will power and planning to overcome, for the following reasons.

To begin, we must address the socio-economic impact of such agreement on the international scale and the possibility of nations being able to keep their promises. The world’s economy is a fluctuating one, filled with occasional unexpected increases or decreases like the ocean’s waves.

Furthermore, the economical state of individual countries also depends upon the societal situation of those nations. If a nation is hampered by war, plagued with diseases, or if the people living there uphold an ultra-conservative mindset, if the people themselves feel disadvantaged due to restrictions placed to enforce the promises their nation made to the COP 26 accord, then it is indeed difficult to witness any significant change. Currently, countries struggle to do even basic steps, such as limiting their non-renewable energy usage, as seen with China’s and India’s dependency on coal. Whereas, most African and developing Asian nations do not possess the means to replace their existing energy infrastructure, and Middle Eastern nations are overly reliant on fossil fuel. In Europe and the Americas, this dependency is also seen clearly and alarmingly.

However, the major contributors of climate change have since tried their best to both make more space for renewable energy to thrive, while doing the most to keep their citizens happy. If practical solutions are clearly laid out, with the ability to satisfy all parties by at least ensuring them their continued economic growth, and social stability after drastic regulations are implemented, then the goal for the “1.5 degree” mark may seem more reachable.

This brings us to our second point, being the problem of third world nations being unable to amass enough assets to aid them in fulfilling their promises with the COP 26 agreement lying dormant.

Throughout the entire conference, as the issue was raised by many poorer countries, the more affluent ones shy away from answering. Nigeria, Iran and many others have demanded many

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compromises including the right for developing states to use fossil fuels just as the developed world had done before them to drive their economies. While nations such as Micronesia, Tuvalu and Uganda struggle to keep their end of the accord, due to lack in funds and resources, alongside experiencing one of the most severe weather phenomena caused by climate change. It was clear that during COP 26, though banded together with great might, their voices still remain unheard.

Yet, there is still hope, as more and more activists, reporters and journalists are bringing this injustice to light and call upon wealthier nations to aid their developing counterparts so that we may all face this dire international crisis on an equal footing.

In conclusion, to fully predict the possibility of whether the goal set out to limit the rise of temperature to 1.5°C and below by the end of the next decade is achievable or not, we must assess the current situation under unbiased eyes and a well-informed mind. My opinion is that this target is feasible, given that the COP 27 meeting in the future yields productive results, by solving the aforementioned issues decisively and practically, with all parties being able to agree upon less compromising grounds than the last negotiation. After answering the mentioned problems, we may stand better and more firmly against the looming climate disaster, and, perhaps, we could even evade it all together, if we try hard enough.

Anika Geol Sekolah Lentera Indonesia Education Inequality and COVID-19 Mahatma Gandhi ji, once said, literacy in itself is no education. Literacy is not the end of education or even the beginning. By education I mean an all-round drawing out of the best in the child and man-body, mind and spirit.

From the very start of the year 2020, everyone in the world has been affected by the COVID-19. Our lives have changed in every way possible. We students and our teachers have especially experienced a great change in terms of education.

COVID-19 has caused suspension and cancellation of teaching and research activities globally.

The virus has also reached its peak in many countries, resulting in a dangerous number of school closures which has kept 90 percent of students out of school. And over 370 million children who were dependent on school meals needed to feed themselves, have been induced to starve since the outbreak. All these events have proven that the education system was drastically affected by the pandemic because it was not built, nor prepared to deal with the current situation.

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COVID-related school closures have affected children unequally, as not all of them have the opportunities or the tools needed to keep the learning process running. As the virus spread over the world, many schools went online, relying on virtual education to replace in-person learning.

However, this is only beneficial to those who live in well-equipped regions. School closures had a significant impact on disadvantaged communities, particularly in countries without the technology required for online learning. Two thirds of the world’s school-age children or 1.3 billion children aged 3 to 17 years old do not have internet connection in their homes. Lack of connectivity doesn’t just limit children’s ability to connect online, it makes it impossible for them to compete in the modern economy. These issues have spread across countries in Africa, Asia, and Latin America, putting additional strain on education systems in developing countries, many of which are already struggling to offer a high-quality education for all. This separates them from the rest of the world.

In Indonesia, students have unequal access to facilities and infrastructure. Online learning heavily depends on network coverage, yet the coverage varies highly between regions. Statistics Indonesia reported that more villages in Java received a strong signal compared to other regions of Indonesia.

There are around 2.1 million students in Papua but only 25 percent of them receive a strong signal.

In 2020, the highest dropout rate in Indonesia was at the high school level, at 1.13 percent. In comparison, the dropout rate at the elementary school level was 0.11 percent. If these numbers continue to increase, the dropouts could experience serious educational deficiencies that severely limit their economic and social well-being throughout their adulthood.

The executive director of the United Nations Children’s Fund, Henrietta Fore pointed out that “the longer children remain out of school, the less likely they are to return.” The COVID-19 pandemic has caused widespread disruption in schools, posing a global education emergency that threatens to derail the education of at least 24 million kids who are expected to drop out. Children greatly suffer when schools are closed for extended periods of time. Their mental health has been affected; they are more vulnerable to child labor and sexual abuse, and they are less likely to break free from the poverty cycle.

Sustainability is defined as meeting our needs without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. Sustainable Development Goal 4 aims to ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all. However, the COVID-19 has erased decades of future plans for this goal.

COVID-19 is very close to destroying the futures of the young, bright, and dedicated minds of this generation. We need to find a better way to deal with the situation because when we deal with education, the decision that we make today will impact tomorrow’s world.

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Ayul Seo Seoul Jamhyun Elementary School Education Inequality and COVID-19 I hear my parents worrying because I can go to school only three days a week. I also hear adults saying they feel sorry for the kids who cannot enjoy what they could have if it was not for the pandemic. So I’m thinking of us, the children of the Pandemic Era. Do we miss that many things? Yes, we do. There are so many things that make us uncomfortable.

However, are we all in the same situation? What about children in other countries? For children in many countries, COVID-19 is more than an inconvenience. It is about health, welfare, or even survival. And children are losing it because they cannot go to school. I’m going to discuss how COVID-19 affects children, especially through education inequality.

First of all, a learning crisis, where schools are closing because of the pandemic, is harming children's health and well-being. According to UNICEF, about 214 million children globally, or 1 in 7 children, have missed 3 quarters or more of their in-person learning. Many children are having online classes, but the effects are not the same as in-person classes. It is not just academic achievement, but also social development, mental and physical health. Children learn how to have relationships with other children and teachers, feel safe and calm in class, and have access to food in school. Online platforms partially help children with these features, but in many ways, they are not enough. Furthermore, in many developing countries, there is a shortage of access to the Internet, for online platforms are as stable as in developed countries.

Second, the increased amount of child labor in low-income countries represents how the pandemic can be affecting children. UNICEF, or the United Nations Children's Fund, has warned that the pandemic can potentially reverse the progress in the past years. Because of the pandemic, many workplaces are closing, and many people are losing their jobs as the result. That means that these people would not have enough money to buy necessities such as food, water, and medical care.

When people don't have enough money to buy or get the necessities for their family, they may turn to child labor, which can have significant consequences for the children’s health and wellbeing. Workplaces like farms or factories are not as safe as schools. Children need to play, exercise, and learn, but those places cannot provide them.

Third, children and teachers in developing countries don’t get vaccinated as fully as in the developed countries. According to WHO, 2 in 3 people in high income countries have been vaccinated with at least one dose while 1 in 8 people in low income countries. Also, essential services like medical services or welfare in developing countries are not as good as in developed

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countries. Threats to the health of school members reduce educational opportunities. This situation is widening the gap between countries and social classes.

People say that it takes years to build things up, but it takes only minutes that it collapses. Once children leave school, it will cost much more time and effort to make them come back. The risk of non-return to school is higher in low income countries or lower social classes. People’s lives have changed dramatically because of COVID-19, and we are adapting ourselves. However, children leaving school is not what we can or should get used to. Children are the future of a world, and it shows the future of the world where children can stay safe at school. This is for any child living anywhere on the planet.

Chaeni Lee Qingdao Chungwoon Korean School Learning Gaps in Developing Countries When debating the impacts of COVID-19 on education, the impacts on developing countries are unignorable. This is because educating students efficiently is literally nonexistent without a good infra for education. Everyone would form a consensus with the fact that most students worldwide are continuing their studies with remote learning, and such remote learning systems are turned out to have poor conditions in developing countries. As the term, ‘education equality,’ means that there is no one falling behind in terms of learning, today, unbalancing of education equality is extremely severe in lowincome countries. In fact, it is apparent that people living in such countries are more vulnerable to COVID-19 since those countries are likely to have poor public health also. With this in mind, the shutdowns of the schools induced an internal disorder, as both teachers and students are not used to remote learning. School systems were understandably overwhelmed and unequipped to respond when COVID-19 began rapidly spreading.

Educating and informing students of new knowledge that they need is basically unachievable without efforts from teachers or counselors. For students, a good educator expects that they clarify any misunderstandings the students might have and convey supplementary information. However, as COVID-19 has changed the learning modality entirely, such challenging conditions made it difficult for students to get the high-quality education that they used to get in traditional schools with great educators. Having the citizens exposed to total chaos, most countries, especially the developing countries, are already facing inequality in everything from resources for education.

Although all nations are putting great efforts into providing their students with opportunities to have effective education, to be frankly spoken, many students just lacked access.

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It is not an overstatement to emphasize the importance of public education for both children and teenagers. However, unfortunately, the pandemic seemed to worsen the rich-poor divide. Twothirds of the world’s school-age children – or 1.3 billion children aged 3 to 17 years old – do not have internet connection in their homes, according to a new joint report from UNICEF and the International Telecommunication Union (ITU). With this in mind, more and more students are lacking access to learning due to the closures of traditional schools concerning the pandemic.

Globally, among school-age children from the richest households, 58 percent have an internet connection at home, compared with only 16 percent from the poorest households. The digital divide is perpetuating inequalities that already divide countries and communities. Children and young people from the poorest households, rural and lower-income states are falling even further behind their peers and are left with very little opportunity to ever catch up.

In light of these facts, regarding the methods to overcome hardships stemming from COVID-19, the significance of closing learning gaps in developing countries is explicitly verified. Therefore, nothing in my mind regarding the previous issue overweighs the ideas stated above.

Chanida Sangchuan Naresuan University COP26 and Climate Change: The Challenges of Cooperation Do you think limiting the global warming below 1.5 degrees can be achieved by 2030? Why or Why not?

There is a chance that we will not achieve the goals that have been set quite high due to a lack of adequate measures. But it's not entirely hopeless. Because at least this historic Agreement will help us stay on the path to limit global temperature rise above 1.5 degrees Celsius. But with environmental issues and massive economies intertwined, the cooperation and commitment of the two main powers: the United States and China are vital to achieving a temperature control goal of no more than 1.5°C. However, the two big countries are blocking the realization of achieving the goals in this Agreement: China and India in their inability to halt the use of their greenhouse gas emitting coalfired or fossil fuel power plants. China and India requested to amend the terms of the Agreement at the last minute. The word "stop using" was changed to "reduce the use of" coal energy instead.

More than that, they need to explain their necessities to countries most at risk of climate change.

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The more countries cooperating, the better. But the other side effect is the difficulty in monitoring and control, especially in developing countries, because countries in this group have more leeway than others. However, China, which claims to be a developing country, uses its status to gain trade advantages. Thus, status change will help create transparency in international trade and create greater responsibility for dealing with climate change. But this leads us to a more subtle question: besides China, is there any other country that deserves or doesn't deserve to be in the group of "developing countries"? Although not as much as underdeveloped countries, developing countries need help and opportunities from developed countries and organizations so that those aids will help build their own countries further. Developing countries must move forward with full strength, take advantage of the opportunities, and maximize their capabilities accordingly for their national interests to become more developed.

Oil, technology, and fuel are necessary for the development process. However, coal is the most significant contributor to climate change, utilized in around 37% of global electricity generation in 2019, mostly by underdeveloped economies. These countries are vulnerable to the effects of natural disasters, especially highlighted in their limited budget and capacity. Hence, developed countries playing an important role in global politics and economy should protect underdeveloped countries. A little out of the way and a bit of a deal wouldn't be too much to lose. Their power and capabilities often have allowed them to do what they want. This time, everything is carried out with a single purpose: the National Interests of one's country, even if there is an agreement. We may then refer to the world's political history where developed countries can claim that it has provided grants to help the countries suffering from climate change to help adapt, cope, and not cause difficulties for their way out of the Agreement.

The pledges made at the COP were all voluntary and under the supervision of their state. Few countries have it legally binding and make it possible to impose sanctions on countries that do not deliver on their promises. But it may cause undesirable effects, and some countries may withdraw from international agreements. What we can do is expect each country to dare to trade some of its national interests for the future of humankind.

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Chau Vu Thang Long University Education Inequality and COVID-19 Due to the impact of COVID-19 pandemic, students have to stay at home and study via online platforms. However, not all students can access to technologies and the Internet. As a result, an educational gap between students appeared. In this essay, I will discuss some possible causes of this problem.

The pandemic has disrupted education nationwide, turning a spotlight on existing racial and economic disparities, and creating the potential for a lost generation. Even before the outbreak, students in vulnerable communities were already facing inequality in everything from resources to student-teacher ratios and extracurriculars.

First of all, the differences between students from a wealthy family and students from poor family are the major cause of educational inequality. Students from rich family can easily access to technology and afford technological devices. Furthermore, they have better opportunity in studying because they can choose high quality institution. However, students from poor family can access to limited technology. During this hard time, many students do not have available technological devices which makes them cannot pursuit their education. Moreover, due to their family financial background, they can only go to school that have low tuition fee and some of them have to work to pay for their education.

Another cause of educational inequality is geographical factor. Students from mountainous regions and rural areas cannot access to the Internet easily like students from other regions.

Therefore, during the pandemic, many students face challenges in studying such as unstable Internet connection which lead to some of them have fallen behind.

Last but not least is family factor. Studying at home has posed serious problem to students, especially young students. Parents need to help their children with their learning and closely observe their children. However, not all parents have a good educational background and some of them have to work outside of home to earn money for their family. Without the aid of their parents, students – especially young learners, tend to be distracted from their studying and cannot keep up with their peers.

In conclusion, unequal education has existed for a long time, even before the appearance of COVID-19. This problem is caused by three main factors, namely socioeconomic factor,

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geographical factor, and family factor. In my opinion, the biggest cause of educational inequality is socioeconomic factor.

Dahyeon Nam Singapore Korean International School Poverty: the Biggest Hindrance of the Education Equality Education is one of the essential parts of life that should be provided to everybody. Everyone should have the right to get educated and pursue what they want to do with their lives. In this situation, children living in poverty are facing lots of barriers to even accessing an education. Although there is a big increased access to education, it is still not enough to prevent many children to access quality education, reasons being lack of funding, religion, political, racial, or sexual.

To begin with, I chose poverty as the main reason of unequal education chances because of the effects of lack of funding to quality education. Enough funding leads to better infrastructures for children to experience varieties of subjects and get to know what other things exists beyond their reach. It also leads to having a more trained teacher, who would teach students properly with their knowledge and wisdom. According to the UN, 69 new million teachers are needed to achieve universal primary and secondary education by 2030. Moreover, there should also be a funding for proper classrooms and learning materials. There are no large classrooms in places and students are studying out of outdated and worn-out textbooks and even share those among several other students. For example, in Tanzania, only 3.5% of 6 graders have a sole use of textbook; in Cameroon, there are 11 to 13 students for every textbook. Textbooks, workbooks, sheets, and all other learning materials are needed to assist the students to understand and learn better.

Furthermore, many students with disabilities are not able to get a chance to study. For instance, up to 95% of disabled children of poor countries are not able to get quality education because of a combination of discrimination, lack of training in inclusive teaching methods, and lack of accessible schools. Disability should not be the reason for leaving schools. In addition, poverty leads to gender problems. Women are often denied from getting proper education for ‘being the wrong gender.’ Over 130 million women around the world are not enrolled in school because of marriage and labor primarily. Even if they do get education, they usually stop before the age of 18 to look after their families. Missed out due to the misconception towards women that they are not worth the education compared to men, women also have the right to get quality education, not spending their lives by looking after their siblings and doing chores.

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Similarly, children that live in a conflicted area cannot get proper education. Their facilities are destroyed and they are exposed to threat under violence. Nearly 250 million children are being affected by conflicts and cannot get adequate education according to their ages. They are in urgent need of educational support.

The COVID-19 has impacted the equality of education as a whole. 1 out of 5 learners is not attending school, 1 out of 4 is not getting higher education, and 102 countries have shut down schools because of the pandemic. There is a need to prioritize students’ responses to the crisis about the COVID-19, dedicate appropriate resources (both financial and technical) for free, quality, and public education, increase funding and support, and minimize the pressure on the educators that remain working. Additionally, students’ average hours of daily learning time has reduced by almost half, and it was significantly big for the low-achievers compared to highachievers. They often replaced the time to watching TV and playing video games than the activities that are much more helpful to their development. There are also comments that the COVID-19 worsened the education inequality between the rich and poor. Since the COVID-19 crisis occurred, science and technology became important, as online classes were being opened to keep students in check and give education right to their status. India and Japan were one of the first to bring smartphones and laptops to their education. However, only about 8 to 10% of students attended, and the influences would be brought out to decades later.

In conclusion, I believe that the main reason for unequal education is due to poverty. This is a problem not only in developing countries but also in developed countries, as there are poor children all around the world. In the sake of all the children in need, there should be enough funding and customized education to each children at their own status (it being poverty, gender, religion, country of conflict, or pandemic) to reach the SDG 4: Quality Education to reality.

Daine Hwang British School Jakarta What do you think is the biggest cause that hinders Education Equality nowadays?

Quarantine, Lockdown, Isolations. Right now we are all facing a life-threatening virus. COVID-19 has been radically transforming our lives. Even our dreams, ‘Sustainable development goals', 17 of our hopes for a better tomorrow, are being affected by a merciless pandemic. Education, in particular, has been greatly interrupted.

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SDG 4 is for quality education. It seeks to provide inclusive and equitable quality education for all. This idea has been an immense success. The UNDP announced that in developing countries, 91 percent of children are enrolled in elementary school, with literacy rates skyrocketing.

Unfortunately, the appearance of COVID-19 became a huge barrier to our ongoing progress.

According to the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, as COVID-19 grows throughout the world in 2020, more than 190 countries had school closures. And it affected around 90 percent (1.57 billion) of all children to pause studies. You would consider online lessons as an alternative. However, 500 million of these children are excluded from the options.

Students struggle to get the devices and internet for online classes. This leads 24 million children to lose the opportunity to participate in class during the lockdown.

But even after the school reopens, they don’t have any access to education since they are already engaged in child labor to support their families. As reported by DW news, India permitted schools to reopen in October 2020, but many children in India's countryside did not return. For example, Asad, a 12-year-old boy, was forced to work in a furniture store. COVID 19 brought economic crisis to his household, so his father pushed him into labour. And now school is no longer a priority.

In the long-term, a child who has been physically laboured will grow up to have low-paying, hazardous employment. Moreover, young labourers grow up to be adults who eventually send their children to work as well. There is an intergenerational cycle of poverty, child labor, poverty, and child labor. As a result, society will be ruined, as non-scholar citizens will restrict economic development and progress. Education leads to greater earnings, and more possibilities in both lives and the country. The country's economy will become more productive as educated workers increase.

On the other hand, private schools have increased their student’s overall grade. Private schools are often associated with students from elite families. So, private schools have larger budgets. The higher the budget, the more successful online classes are. My school, for example, has an app that allows teachers to monitor our activities. There will be a warning if we visit non-scholar websites such as YouTube and games. Also, because all of the work is interconnected to the teacher, they can see my screen on how I am solving the worksheets. Thus, teachers are able to assist us individually with the issues we are encountering very easily. As a result, my Math and English classes' total grades rose dramatically. To summarise, the unwanted gap is getting monumental by the second. The UN's SDG, which was aimed at being achieved by 2030, has been disrupted.

We can no longer delay. What should the SDGs now aim for? We should start to investigate how we can conclude this world group project successfully. Remember, no one should be left behind!

Thank you.

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Dayoung Lee Branksome Hall Asia On Goals for Preventing Climate Change On 12 December 2015, 197 countries officially confirmed to limit global warming to 2 degrees and preferably 1.5 degrees Celsius. This is called the Paris Agreement, created with an intention to reduce the speed of global warming, as well as encourage sustainability globally. Unfortunately, people are not on track for the mission. Judging from records of what people have done for the past years, limiting global warming below 1.5 degrees will be an extremely challenging task, if not impossible.

While there are some aspects where people are on the right track, the progress is happening at a slow rate. The portion of renewable energy in electricity generation is constantly rising and more electric vehicles are being put into use, which shows that people are in the right direction. Same for public financial support for fossil fuels–multiple governments, including USA, UK, and Denmark have agreed to stop financing for overseas fossil fuel projects. The problem is that the rate of progress has to near double in order to keep up for the mission of limiting global warming.

Additional effort would be necessary; for instance, China and Japan, who are one of the major funders of the fossil fuel industry, have not made any promises to reduce their financing.

Although the progress mentioned above is not perfect, the information mentioned above is the best part. In other categories, progress is very small or stagnant, with almost no improvement.

This is the case for reforestation, green hydrogen production, and climate finance, as well as carbon intensity of cement and steel production. In order to reach sufficient levels to limit global warming, the acceleration rate of reforestation and recovery of ecosystems must increase by three, and the amount carbon intensity of steel production will have to decrease by up to 30 percent. In some cases, the rate of progress is slow because finding the balance between reducing climate change and fast economic growth is burdensome. The situation of other cases call for more support for environmentally-friendly developments and new technologies that can make reducing climate change easier.

In other categories used to judge progress for limiting global warming, the worst-case scenario is happening; change is heading in the wrong direction. The rate of deforestation has been rising since 2010, and the rate must decrease by 70 percent. Various factors that contribute to the challenges of bringing an end to deforestation, such as demand for beef and palm oil, hinder sustainable development. For these situations, it is unlikely for the progress to change direction any time.

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With the rapid change of climate in the recent years, the need for active efforts to limit global warming is becoming more and more significant. On the other hand, from the information stated above, the possibility of global warming staying below seems quite bleak. Although the progress for reducing the speed of global warming is not sufficient at best and is going backwards at worst, it is never late to make changes to protect the environment.

Children’s Rights during the COVID-19 Pandemic Given that adults have more serious symptoms compared to children when infected by COVID19, it is easy to think that children would not be affected as much as adults during the pandemic.

In reality, children are facing difficulties about as much as adults, or even more. Judging from the changes in the progress of the Sustainable Development Goals, specifically Goal #4, #5, and #6, it is easy to know that the current pandemic posed various threats to children’s rights.

COVID-19 led countless children to be experiencing learning loss, primarily from school closures and disparities that affected their availability of quality education. 101 million, or 9 percent of children in 1st grade to 8th grade fell below minimum reading proficiency in 2020, and ⅔ of students were affected by school closures. Children from poor families and vulnerable communities were especially affected since they had limited resources compared to the rest.

Without proper measures, this will worsen the issue of the gap between social classes because learning loss is proven to have a long-term impact all through adulthood.

The pandemic worsened the progress for gender equality, as well. Children were not excluded from the harm of gender inequality. With many children staying at home rather than going to school, the number of child marriages significantly increased. As a result of the pandemic, 10 million more girls are at risk of being subject to child marriage in the next decade. Given that there are more girls who are married as children compared to boys and that child marriage can negatively impact children’s opportunities to receive education and develop their careers, this is a sign of gender inequality.

With one of the best ways to prevent the spread of COVID-19 being sanitation, the supply of clean water and sanitization services became even more important than before. Fortunately, there was some progress with Goal 6, ensuring availability and sustainable management of water and sanitation. Safe drinking water and sanitation services increased in the past few years. However, children in vulnerable communities and homeless children, with their limited water and sanitation supplies, were still exposed to more danger than others.

Then, what are the ways to help children whose rights are at risk? Most issues related to children’s rights that arose with the pandemic spur from children not being able to go to school and the limited resources they have. One of the best ways to support children’s rights is to provide education for them, regardless of whether the school they initially enrolled in was closed or not.

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Providing children with educational materials and financial support for school-related fees are possible, as well as adopting various learning methods such as radio, apps, and printed materials depending on what is available and most effective for the community. Child marriage can be prevented by focusing on families living in poverty since many child marriages happen from poverty, which is also linked to a lack of education, especially for girls. Another way to help is supplying clean water and sanitation services in poor communities and for homeless children.

Children’s rights, which had progressed in the past years, have been worsened in various aspects due to the pandemic. The effects of learning loss, child marriage, and lack of sanitation services for children are very concerning. Especially in these difficult times, it is most important for all to provide support to children in the most effective way possible.

Donghwan Yi Seoul Youngil High School Is Disarmament for Peace the Right Answer?

Throughout human history, humankind seems to be always drawn to violence and war. All people need to do is open a history book and it will be filled with all the major wars and battles. Even recently with the whole Ukraine and Russia situation, war has been a part of human culture and history since the dawn of written history. How could humans as a collective stop something that seems to be so ingrained into our psyche and nature? Peace isn’t a tangible thing that should be rewarded it is a state of being, where the vast majority of people can agree that the current state of affairs around the world and locally feel safe.

The problem is that many people have different ideas and viewpoints on what their version of peace is and since the United Nations can’t cater to everybody’s needs at once many organizations have proposed plans to get rid of what they think are causing the wars and bloodshed, however they are not without flaw or merit.

It is a logical choice to get rid of the weapons that these wars are fought with. However, since gun control in some countries is more of an issue with individuals than the entire nation the legislation around those could get dirty quickly. Currently the United Nations as well as related organizations have propose the disarmament of weapons of mass destruction. For example, chemical which even the Nazis condemned use in the battlefield during World War 2 and nuclear weapons, the first iteration of which were created at the tail end of World War 2. The last example shows that during times of war weapons technology takes quantum leaps to ensure victory to either side. But these advancements in weapons technology have also been advancements in people’s everyday

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lives. The birth of the nuclear bomb has opened humanity’s eyes to nuclear fission, a much more efficient and cleaner source of energy than fossil fuels if utilized correctly. Nuclear weapons also are a major deterrent to other countries. Due to mutually assured destruction a nuclear bomb hasn’t been used in a war since its two first detonations during the end of World War 2. This in turn could have possible saved more lives since less full-out wars caused by the fear of nuclear animation these weapons instill in people.

However, it can’t be understated that certain bad actors who have these weapons do pose a threat to anybody within their range. But this gets in to a very sticky situation in whether people should blame the weapon or the people wielding the weapons with malicious intent. These bad actors won’t follow international laws or agreements so by disarming the rest of the world people would be getting rid of their silver bullet they could have utilized against these bad actors.

I personally believe that the bigger issue is changing the culture and mindset of people worldwide on war and peace. People also seems to put blame on something else and I believe that is what is happening with the current situation with disarmament. Nuclear weapons which are the clearest example have given humanity a new way of understanding particle physics and new source of cleaner, better energy. It seems that disarming the world of nuclear weapons would also at the very least put a very heavy regulation on the research and further development of nuclear physics.

Total disarmament is not the right answer I believe, it would be better to create a mutual understanding of each other’s nations and their motives. Better communication is the key to world peace, not getting rid of the weapons of mass destruction. In desperate times of war, the countries will just force their scientists to create new ones to replace them anyways. Especially during these times where we can all contact each other easily the United Nations could provide a platform for these countries with differing ideals to talk and discuss each other viewpoints in order to reach a more civilized way of peace.

Franchesca Wyette Gaerlan University of the Philippines Rural High School Education Opens a Door for Opportunities, but at What Cost?

I firmly believe that poverty was, and still is, the most common reason for education inequality, whether that be before or during this pandemic. There was an undoubtedly evident shift in our everyday lives when 2020 rolled around.

The new year had introduced us to a different kind of environment. One we had to now adapt to and treat as our new normal. One of the many changes that occurred

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particularly to our educational systems is changing from face-to-face classes into online classes.

Admittedly, it was a good idea on paper, regardless, it is still not without its obstacles.

Complications soon arose, notably with students' internet connections, home setups, and their respective abilities to focus and actually learn while still at home.

Poverty is still a tremendous concern in the Philippines, and the accumulating debt we owe is no laughing matter either. Here, while the rich only get richer, the poor only become poorer. Poverty is the central problem we face as a third-world country. And it is quite obviously seen in the number of crises we have encountered over the years as a result of poverty. The Philippines boasts an extensive and highly inclusive education system stemming from the lasting impression of the Spanish, Japanese, and American colonization. The country's system of education has also long since served as a model for other Southeast Asian countries, though in recent years, that system has deteriorated. The current pandemic only made providing quality education more challenging, mainly for developing countries, like the Philippines. We lacked the fundamental infrastructure and facilities needed to provide effective learning environments. There is still a vast difference in the education received by children from wealthier families than children from middle to lower class families, especially during this pandemic. While others had the capacity to buy new gadgets to attend classes, most students did not, myself included. Admittedly, my situation is better than most, taking into account the fact that I have a low tuition fee. But, the same does not apply to the number of students who were still required to pay a hefty amount for the miscellaneous expenses despite only learning at home. Countless people had already lost their jobs and had no steady income whatsoever, yet schools still required students to pay an absurd amount of miscellaneous fees.

Everybody knew that remote learning would pose countless challenges for many students. Buying a laptop, tablet, or mobile phone plus securing a stable internet connection is quite costly. Parents worry about the extra expense on their children's education and the financial burden this entails for many who barely make ends meet. Not everyone can afford the dictated "basic" needs of online classes. People barely have enough money to provide enough food on the table. Most would definitely not have enough money to spare for new laptops, tablets, or cellphones, nor do all of them have access to stable internet connections. Proper quality education was already in favor of the upper-class, nevertheless, this pandemic only further exacerbates that gap between the quality of education received by the fortunate and the less fortunate. Furthermore, even if they did have access to those things, it doesn't eliminate the possibility of a student's inability to adjust to this new way of learning. As a student myself, I have first-hand experience of how difficult and distracting it is to learn at home. We associate our homes, more specifically our rooms, with "me time," so the unavoidable change of our environments while studying was no doubt challenging.

The first year of online learning was a rough ride for students and teachers alike. I, myself, found it tough to put my whole focus and attention on this new mode of learning. The new setup also meant more work for teachers because they now had to create more educational content containing essential lessons but were still simple enough for students to digest on their own.

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I understand that the continued pursuit of education is crucial even during these trying times, for education opens doors to a world of opportunities. Our Department of Education's secretary has already stated before that "education must continue." And although I do agree with her statement, should it continue even at the cost of the student's physical or mental well-being? Finally, I believe that finding a sustainable solution to decrease — or preferably, to stop altogether — the steady rise of people living in poverty can make a difference in facing, and finally solving, the countless issues that stem mainly from poverty.

Genill Marquisse Pullan San Lorenzo School Education for the Betterment of Future Generations Education is valuable. It helps us to get a good life and a good future. When you study hard, you will get smarter, and when you get smarter, your life will become better since you will be able to land a good job that pays well in the future.

However, education can be expensive to afford for some, so not all children can get formal education. How can a poor family afford to spend for the internet connection if the income that they get is just enough for their everyday lives?

Education is one of the important things COVID-19 has affected. Students were not allowed to go to school and learning is being done either online or modular. Lucky are those who can access the internet as easily as they could. The saddening part goes to the ones who cannot afford to pay the service provider the application fee and monthly bills to be able to access the internet and do online classes, five days a week. Poverty is the root cause that hindrances education equality.

Technology plays an important role in this kind of pandemic situation. From only books, notebooks, pencils, and pens as some of the basic needs we need for schooling, electricity, stable internet access, computer, and or cellphone add up to this list for us to be able to continue our learning these days. Some students from private schools transferred to public schools because their parents cannot afford these requirements, and public schools practice the “modular mode” wherein students are given hard copies of activities they need to accomplish without the need to access the internet, but parents are needed to guide their children in place of the teacher. This just broadens the gap between social classes and shows that education is in reality, not equal for all, especially in poor countries where many parents have not completed their basic education but are now being pressured by the situation to teach the basics to their children. Parents are responsible for their children. It is the parent's responsibility to provide for their children’s needs. However, some parents were not able to go or finish school because of the same reason, poverty, so they

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won’t know how to help their children with their homework. As much as a child wants to learn well, because of COVID-19 and the situation they are in, they can’t. If only students would realize how lucky they are that they can attend classes without worrying about anything more, unlike those who cannot because attending school would mean additional expense for the family who is already struggling in life. The government can help. The government must ensure that no one is left behind. They need to support those who need to be. Proper governance must be applied now more than ever. Politicians should stop wanting more power, they should stop quarreling with each other, and must focus on the needs of the people. They should serve the people for the betterment of each country and humanity because lack of support from the government also hindrances education equality for children in a country.

Considering that poverty is the main cause of education inequality, as students, we need to study hard and pay attention to our future, so we would have a better life for the next generations.

Remember that there is always an opportunity to become better and rich. What we need to do is work hard for our future and fight poverty by doing everything we can to help ourselves and others in improving our lives. Ironic it is that lack of education can cause poverty and then poverty hindrances to education equality. The government and its people must help each other so no one child will stop learning and be left behind. Proper use of resources must be done and support must be given to those who are in need to be able to reduce the poverty that humankind is experiencing today.

Geon Hyeon Kim Jinsan Middle School Achieving Peace and Disarmament “Peace” is a very abstract concept. Therefore, all the people will have different definitions of peace. However, there must be a clear direction that peace should go ahead. I think peace should primarily go ahead for no war, no international dispute, and no national dispute. This is actually impossible to achieve perfectly in our world, as we are the social animal that must have conflicts. However, having peace as our human being’s total goal is having great meaning itself. This can help all the countries to cooperate with each other and respect each other. However, at the same time, many countries are still developing their weapons.

This keeps all the countries aware of each other, and always being ready to war. Also, nationally, there must be no armed fight between citizens. Conflicts happening through the process for a nation must exist, but when it changes to emotional fight and causes human casualties, those should never exist.

One of the most important factors to achieve peace is disarmament. Weapons are the biggest factor that can break trust between countries. The fact itself that some countries are developing weapons

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is a big threat to other countries. If it cycles, all the countries tend to develop their weapons more and more, and it becomes a competition. Disarmament is the only way to reduce that competition.

If one of the strong countries does disarmament, other countries will also be stable and follow the step to do disarmament. Disarmament has a big role in making countries believe in each other, and being able to make a safe world without having lots of weapons that can kill us anytime.

To relate with current issues, the Ukraine-Russia war can be an example. Ukraine and Russia are currently in the state right before war. It is okay to think that war has already started. Russia has unofficially invaded Ukraine’s some villages already. This war that might happen soon occurred mainly because of Ukraine joining NATO. NATO is the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, which constitutes a system of collective security, whereby its independent member states agree to mutual defense in response to an attack by any external party. Therefore, NATO is actually a military alliance. It was originally formed with North American countries, and Western European countries. However, more and more countries near East Europe have joined NATO. Now, Ukraine tries to join NATO, however, for Russia’s position, they cannot easily allow this. If Ukraine, which is a bordering country of Russia, joins NATO, Russia is being militarily isolated from Europe and North America. Therefore, Russia tries hard to stop their NATO join, and that’s the main reason for making a war. This is the problem happening by threats with each other from weapons. This can be solved if two countries, Ukraine and Russia, had less interest in the military.

If disarmament had been done steadily before, we might not have made a situation like this between Ukraine and Russia. That might help two countries to believe each other and not get any threat of harm.

Furthermore, the North Korea issue is also having a close relationship with disarmament. North Korea is having nuclear weapons, and they are having other lots of weapons like missiles that can harm South Korea anytime they want. They have been threatening South Korea for numerous days. Those threats always make South Korea citizens to be in threat always. This is all because North Korea’s keep going on developing weapons and showing off. This situation makes us, South Korea, also develop our weapons.

Children’s Rights during the COVID-19 Pandemic COVID-19 pandemic has been bringing up numerous harms on our human society. It is the biggest disaster that we have met near days. It broke our daily life and restricted our basic rights a lot.

This disaster was really critical to children who need to get educations. I strongly believe that COVID-19 situation worsens children’s right, especially the right to get education.

COVID-19 started in November. 2019. Starting, 2020, all of the people were not free to do things which was originally rightful thing to do. This impacted education of children critically. At early time when pandemic started, students did not go to school for a while. After, for about a year, online education was the main in South Korea. Until now, we are doing online classes and school classes at the same time. However, when mutation virus like Delta or Omicron pops up, it keeps

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us to stay home for more time. South Korea, comparably, was having good internet system in general in most of the houses. However, for the developing countries lack of internet system, I could imagine their education would be not working properly at all. This situation is definitely a situation that student’s right to get education is invaded. This is a not normal problem. Students must get proper education, which they are the ones who will be responsible in our future. Even students who got alternative education using way of online education, task-based education, they must have gotten not proper education that they must get. This harmed student’s right to be educated a lot.

Then, our society should find the fastest way that we can solve this problem. COVID-19 must be a bad disease. That’s fact. However, we are not sure if it is a “critical disease” which can kill many people. The answer is no. Most of the deaths are coming from old people who originally had some underlying diseases. For normal people, it just passes like a flu or a cold. Then, as students are very young that they are in the age which they are the healthiest, should we make them stay home, not bring them to school? I think there will be no big problem for them to just come to school every day, and just wear masks well and follow quarantine rules. If confirmed cases happen, it will be just enough to make that class get PCR test. I think for the students who are healthy, the most important thing for them is to get education.

Giang Hà Hanoi University A global struggle for 1.5 degrees One and a half degrees above average – It seems like insignificant change for the common people to really notice about. After all, they think “It’s only barely two degrees, it would just feel like a normal seasonal change.” And people would move on with their daily life that they deem more interested than a slight change in the weather. People often underestimate that a small number could hardly do anything significant to their lives. But this deceptively small degrees of 1.5 Celsius could cause a huge global crisis in the long run that would devastate every country ecological and eventually, economical for years to come if we keep this indifferent attitude towards this looming problem.

An increase of 1.5 degrees could devastate the quality and quantity of both crop and livestock since they are particularly sensitive to a sudden rise of temperature, expose to the risk of potentially dangerous new diseases that could transmit to human. A 1.5 degrees global warming is also the reason of rising sea level due to melting of ice cap and it is projected to rise from 0.26

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meters to 0.77 meters in 2100, causing ten of million people at risk of losing their homes, some countries may even cease to exist because of rising in sea level: Kiribati, Micronesia, Maldives, etc.

Noticing an imminent threat toward a global crisis, leaders of the world gathered in numerous conferences, notably the 26th Conference of the Parties (COP26) to negotiate and enhance every country commitment towards mitigation in climate change to decisively limiting global warming below to 1.5 degrees by 2030. But is the goal can really be achievable? I do not have high hopes for this goal to meets it target at the end of 2030. Look back at the COP26 some of the world leaders in largest greenhouse gas emissions countries in the world did not participate in the Conference notably China, Russia, and Brazil. To reach the target of mitigation climate change to 1.5 degrees, the world needs to reduce 45% of the carbon dioxide emissions by 2030. The emissions in these three countries alone are more than 1/3 of the world emission with China is the world’s largest with 29% by 2019. If the world’s major emitters did not show a cooperative and commitment towards the problem, no matter how much the rest of the world try to limit global warming, it would not be as effective. The reason behind why these countries refused to attend is partially around industrialization and economic growth. Since the developing nations typically have a higher rate of emissions than developed countries because of the high concentrate in industrialization to boost the nation economically. To reduce emissions is to halt their industrialize progress, which is costly not mentioning there are no reliable renewable energy that could totally eclipse the cheaper fossil fuels and cement that fueled the large demand of an industrializing country. That’s why many of these world leaders refuse to show a clear commitment towards COP26 because they put the interest of their countries higher than the global problem. While there are finance aid negotiations for developing countries to adapt with mitigation of climate change, the developed nations are unlikely to reach an agreement due to donors prefer the finance aid as a chance of making profit, worsening the trust between developed and developing nations.

With this situation is still ongoing, the goal of limiting global warming to 1.5 degrees is likely a vague promise. The situation of climate change right now is like a powder keg to untold crisis, but the world leaders are all ignoring it and some even light a cigar on top of it. The only way to prevent this global problem now is to find a common ground between major parties of the world, a commitment by the great nations to put aside their differences and pride to really sit together to negotiate a reasonable way to mitigate climate change, then the goal could be more achievable.

The developed nations should financially aid the developing nations to adapt with the new change, not a way to make profit and exploit them in the future, then the developing countries could have an economical guarantee to further pursue mitigation of climate change. Deforestation needs to be supervised closely and reduce eventually since it is one of the main contributors to global warming. Deforesting could cause more catastrophic natural disasters in the long run both in the region and globally.

In short, with both lack of commitment from major parties in the world and distrust between wealthy and poor nations, the global goal of limiting global warming to 1.5 degrees by 2030 is

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less likely to achieve with just promises without agreement and action. 1.5 may be small number but without dealing with it, it could have significant effect that produce far greater problems in the future if we still ignoring it now.

Hara Jang Abeka Academy Education Inequality and COVID-19 The COVID-19 pandemic has been a gigantic change in many lives for these past 2 years, now coming up to 3. And people all have been trying to get used to all the changes in their daily lives. Especially children, as they try to get used to the new online education at home, which is now forcing many students to quit school in the developing nations, broadening the educational gap between the developing, and developed nations.

The chance of education has never been evenly distributed to students all around the world, and this has been getting worse because of the recent pandemic. This is a problem because education inequalities eventually lead to unequal educational success, and students who do not get a good education are more likely to fall into poverty. There are three, two, or only one reason as to why education is unequal depending on how you look at this problem.

The first reason is poverty, the number 1 goal of the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Now that a pandemic that shows no sign of slowing down is forcing students to go online, they need computers, phones, plus the things they already need for attending school. And not many students can actually afford all of that, especially in the developing nations where many of the citizens are poor.

The second reason is segregation, meaning some students are given better education depending on their race, skin color, gender, or otherwise. There are lots of reasons why some people would segregate against other people.

The last reason is COVID-19. This recent pandemic has pressured many students and people both financially, and mentally. Many have dropped out of school because they didn’t have the money, especially people in the developing nations. Only people who have the money can have a quality education.

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Among these reasons, poverty pressures students the most, financially, meaning the student can’t support the needs of their education, and mentally, meaning that the student may get stressed out too much to study. Poverty is a serious issue on many problems, it divides the barrier between the developed, and developed countries. And if it isn’t fixed soon, our world will be in danger.

Hsueh-Jui Wang Jungle Lion Education Inequality and COVID-19 Years of steady progress in educating more children worldwide ended abruptly in 2020, with 1.4 billion students kept away from school. The outbreak of COVID-19 affected all kinds of students, while COVID-19 and the pandemic continue to spread globally. Measures are introduced to address the problem, countries decided to close schools to enforce distancing and lower the burden for the country. According to UNESCO, an estimated 138 countries have closed schools nationally while others have regional policies, affecting more than 90% of students. The most significant impact is not people who live highly above the poverty line, but detrimental to the most marginalized individuals, coming from unequal backgrounds that prevent them from accessing numerous resources and further exacerbate inequality between families.

Education has a direct impact on the gradual decrease of poverty. A quality education supports a child's development of social, emotional, and communication skills. Education programs also benefit the development of knowledge and valuable skills for the future of these students. By providing universal access to education, UNESCO ensures inclusive and quality education for all and promotes lifelong learning. As we all know, students who receive an education will have more opportunities since they can receive a diploma, and then they will have access to a broader labour market, a leverage for them to get high paid jobs. Without proper education, children will be trapped into a vicious cycle where the next generation of low-income families will remain in poverty.

With more than 80% percent of students affected, 30 million students not being able to eat school meals, and people coming from low-income families unable to afford electronic devices and the internet, the crisis of COVID has created severe damage to the poor and a detrimental increase in the education gap. Actions are needed to ameliorate, mitigate and adjust issues. The continuation of school meals is essential for children who cannot even afford a living. Governors should consider subsidizing low-income families. Teachers need to change their teaching style, to ensure

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kids without the internet still get the chance to learn. Actions must be taken immediately to prevent long-lasting inequalities.

How can youth contribute Although it may seem to be hard for an average youth to create changes in the society and advocate for the improvement of our world, there are many ways for us to contribute. Due to the economic limitations a youth might face, therefore donating and organizing events may not be as feasible as voicing out the issue and raising awareness, which are the two best ways out of many choices.

Students can share the difficulties they’ve been through, and try to gain support from social media.

For example, the #METOO movement was a movement in which many people voiced out the sexual harassment they’ve faced, allowing more people to understand the problem. Raising awareness includes distributing the news with classmates, friends and relatives. When more people are advocating to solve the issue, the bigger the critical mass is. Critical mass is essential for pressuring politicians to make changes on laws and policies. Critical mass affects whether a movement is influential and supported by government.

Children’s right COVID suddenly appeared in our society, impacting our society in a negative form. Production of medical supplies can’t keep up with the demand. Extortionate number of individuals lost their job and became economically unstable. Poverty and hunger are current issues around the world, but most importantly, COVID-19 hindered the ability of 1.4 billion children to access education.

Poverty may seem like the main reason that children are kept away from school cannot continue education, while that might be true, we have to acknowledge that there are many ways to replace in person classes at school. Education isn’t limited to online classes which requires a good setup of laptop, earphones, monitor, speakers and etc. There are many alternatives that are cheaper such as recording the class and playing it on mp3 player, handing out worksheet and textbooks that are easy to follow and has a step-by-step guide, which allows student to study on their own. Subsidies should be handed out to families in the form of vouchers, to ensure proper usage of the money on products related to education eg. books, pens, notebooks.

School meals are essential for the well-being of students. More than 30 million students cannot afford nutritious food, relying heavily on school meals to stay healthy and alive. Without school meals, children will undergo a potential food crisis, risking their health and lives. Hence the continuation of school meals during the crisis of COVID is a necessity.

Proper education can end the vicious cycle of poverty found on students from marginalized backgrounds. Although the changes might not create a significant effect instantly, but at least we should provide an alternative instead of nothing. Actions must be taken immediately to prevent long-lasting inequalities among the younger generation.

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Hyungeon (Andrew) Chung Dwight school Seoul The Relation between Disarmament and Peace I think that peace is a difficult concept to understand. Many people have different opinions of peace, but the general understanding would be that peace defines a period of time where there is no war and everything is undisturbed by violence. To begin with, I do not believe that undisturbed peace is an achievable aspect. We humans often decide to result to violence, and this has grown more common in the modern world. There are all kinds of conflict that disrupt our daily lives, on small scales and larger ones. At times, people cannot help arguing in order to get their opinions across, but there are also some who would not consider this to be a disruption of peace.

Disarmament is the act of reducing the weaponry distributed among the military. This would in fact help the overall peace between communities. Without the proper weaponry, fights among people would mainly be hand to hand combat, which would not last long. According to un.org, the disarmament of nuclear weapons was “The first resolution adopted by the UN General Assembly in 1946 established a Commission to deal with problems related to the discovery of atomic energy among others.” (un.org). When there is a war (a disruption to peace), there are numerous weapons used, especially for long range. If weapons used for mass destruction such as nuclear were to be limited or abolished, this would make peace a more likely possibility.

Many may believe that disarmament would be ideal for peace because of the total loss of weaponry used for destructive purposes. The reduction of the weapons that are being transported from country to country would also make it easier for those already at peace to remain so, eliminating the possibility of using nuclear weapons or missiles to threaten others. Starting from the time that nuclear weapons were developed, many countries were using this newfound power to threaten neighbouring countries. This would cause panic and political arguments to break out.

Besides the reduction of nuclear weapons, digging deeper, there is also the need to limit the amount of chemical weapons produced. Chemical and biological weapons can be used to spread disease across a wide area, diseases such as this could also be spread around the world due to the difficulty to contain those (Biological weapons). During WWI, the two sides of the conflict used chemical weapons to spread poisonous gas, resulting in an overwhelming number of casualties.

“Since World War I, chemical weapons have caused more than one million casualties globally.”

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(un.org). This shows that chemical weaponry has already taken many lives, and so eliminating this would be better for both the environment and people.

Overall, disarmament would help all of us achieve the goal we have for peace, but not entirely.

Personally, believing that peace is a goal that we need to forever work toward, it is not just the weaponry that is causing the disruptions to peace but also human nature. Peace is shattered when political arguments occur between two opposing sides, the reasons may be extremely complex and difficult to understand while still benign petty, not enough to start a war or conflict over.

Therefore, reducing the amount of weapons and dangerous equipment being produced for the militaries all over the world would be a great step toward peace, justice and strong institutions.

Children’s Rights during the COVID-19 Pandemic During the COVID-19 pandemic, there have been many protests as to the rights of children and also adults. The right to education: many of the younger children may have had limitations in receiving a proper education during COVID-19, with the factor of not being able to leave home, not spending time at school, and constantly being on computers. Those in less urban areas would not have access to online materials, therefore classes were near impossible to attend since the shutdown of school. This would have dramatically worsened the quality of education and hindered a student’s ability to learn. The pandemic may have forced many children to mature at a younger age, learning their responsibilities and the dangers of the world before it would have been necessary without COVID. This relates closely with the SDG number 4, which is all about quality education, which children may not have necessarily been able to receive during COVID. Gender equality may also have been difficult during this time due to the lack of contact between different people. When being online, the communication between students and children may have been affected, which may cause miscommunication. During this time, women and children may also have been treated differently due to the fact of being cooped up at home. There may have been a problem of domestic violence, which is also a discriminative factor. According to https://interactive.unwomen.org, ⅔ people classified as not employed, educated or being trained are women.

During the pandemic, through infected cases, close contact, none have really been healthy. Clean water and sanitation is also an SDG that has been affected by COVID-19. Due to all the time and effort being focused on COVID, there may have been other important issues relating to health that were momentarily ignored. At some point during this time, most children have probably experienced the effects of COVID. Of course, the containment of the virus has helped the health of children and adults, but the vaccines for children were authorised later than those for adults and thus may have also affected the health of children.

With COVID still spreading around the world, there is not much that can be done besides setting up proper vaccination locations and making sure that the vaccine can be distributed to children.

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After children receive booster shots, schools could allow them to go to in person school and thus help their rights to education, the right to gender equality, to have clean sanitation and good hygiene. Now that the vaccine has been authorised for younger children, it will be safer to allow more rights for children. Allowing them to experience their childhood properly by letting them meet with friends in and out of school under safe conditions. Immunisation helps their health and also allows proper communication and schooling. Overall, many things have already been done to return these rights to those who have lost them, but much could be done in order to speed the process of distributing vaccines, especially to rural locations where children and families are less fortunate than in urban areas.

The role of the youth in the SDGs and how the youth could contribute to enhance the children’s rights worldwide The Sustainable Development Goals is a set of goals that aims to use innovative solutions to solve modern problems. This set of goals that are to be solved by 2030 is also a foundation for more effective responses and recovery from COVID. During the pandemic, many of the steps we have made toward achieving the goals may have been hindered, but now we are working toward a fast recovery from COVID and more advancements toward these goals.

During this pandemic, a lot of children experienced the difficulties of having some rights taken away. Many students believed that online education was not as effective as it was in person, and that students would not take away much from each lesson. This may have been a blow for quality education, especially since some less privileged areas experienced no school for months due to the lack of modern technology. Computers and phones have become necessities in a student and adult’s daily lives and those who do not have access to modern technologies may have been stuck in very tricky positions.

I believe that there are many ways in which the youth could contribute to children’s rights at the moment. Starting by sharing our personal experiences of online learning and the difficulties of COVID-19, we can help some understand the different situations we were all in and how we dealt with those. There could be a platform created where anyone younger than the age of 18 could access in order to provide everyone else with helpful information and tips. By doing this, we can learn more about what actually happens around the world and not just using a biased opinion from seeing the pandemic in one perspective.

With many young people talking about the rights for children, this will also help us understand more about each other and how we can respect and allow others to also have the same rights as we do. This spread of awareness would allow us to learn more about the different children’s rights that are needed for example, the right to gender equality, clean water and sanitation, education and such development goals. In order to improve these rights, first everyone should have knowledge about those rights. Then, after gaining an understanding, we can help bring out the

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rights in each other, allowing others to experience the same rights as us instead of unintentionally discarding their rights.

Juha Bae CMIS Canada On the prevailing educational inequality within the modern world As COVID sweeps around the globe, the world is shifting faster than ever towards the next step. New platforms supporting online learning emerge as students increasingly use technology. Gaining all these opportunities, however, is not the only part. Just as much of an advantage there is, we must be aware of how serious the problem of the backside of the situation is. We must find a way to illuminate the shadowed part of the era.

First, the lack of access to technology hinders educational opportunities for students, especially in developing countries. Reportedly, 39% of minors in the world do not have access to the internet, according to the National Center for Education Statistics. The lack of educational opportunities prevails in the developing countries, deterring their advancement. The disadvantage could lead to an endless cycle of undereducated generations and underdevelopment. For example, Afghanistan, a severe LDC, can provide internet service to only 13.5% of its population, the World Bank reports.

Several other data shows a shocking upturn of 1.3 million uneducated children in Afghanistan after the breakout. As the world turns towards online learning, we need a way to provide equal and quality education to even those who do not have access to technology. If only those with technology are provided with the necessary education, the gap between the two groups will increase, aggravating the gap between the rich and the poor.

The problem due to the lack of access to technology does not end here. As online learning increases, more and more online resources like Preply emerge. It may seem like there is no problem here since it is making extra education available for more people. However, inequality continues to prevail. Those who do not have access to the internet continue to be excluded as those who do have access to the internet also have access to these online resources, aggravating the gap between those who can access the service and those who cannot. Furthermore, the inequality of access to resources creates more problems like the increasing gap between the rich and poor.

Considering how many online websites providing educational services cost money, it must be kept in mind that there is a difference in the extent to which individuals can financially be

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supported. Therefore, the increase in online resources can be considered harmful to educational equality.

We must find a way to provide adequate technology to those deprived of their educational rights due to the absence of the internet. And just as it is critical to provide technology to all, we also need to know when to distinguish whether the plan is feasible or not and create alternatives accordingly. The more delayed the solution gets, the more severe the consequences get. Humanity is shifting to a whole new era of technology. To prevent the top elites with the most access to new technology from monopolizing over the society, nobody must be left behind.

Kayeon Park Gawon elementary school COP26 and Climate Change Climate change has become a big problem. While it has been getting better with the coming for COVID-19 because of the rapid decline of carbon emissions, it can’t be stopped completely.

Because of climate change, icebergs are melting in the polar regions and sea levels are rising. It has also become noticeably hotter in certain areas. So the UN held the global climate summit wrapping up in Glasgow is known as COP26, with COP standing for Conference of the Parties. In diplomatic parlance, “the parties” refers to the 197 nations that agreed to a new environmental pact, the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. It agreed that countries will meet next year to pledge further cuts to emissions of carbon dioxide. This is to try to keep temperature rises within 1.5C by 2030, which scientists say is crucial to prevention of a "climate catastrophe". But current pledges to reduce climate change will only reduce the global warming limit from about 2.7C to about 2.4C. So, is it possible to limit warming to 1.5C? The four main goals of COP26 are: "Secure global net-zero by mid-century and keep 1.5C degrees within reach, adapt to protect communities and natural habitats, mobilize finance, and work together to deliver." This will involve calls to accelerate the phasing out of coal, curtail deforestation, speed up the switch to electric vehicles, and encourage investment in renewables.

So the nations involved with COP26 agreed to the Glasgow Climate Pact, which states that carbon emissions will have to fall by 45 percent by 2030 to keep alive the 1.5C goal. And COP 26 did succeed in some things. Agreement on transparency - such as how and when emissions, finance and adaptation actions in each country are reported - was a big win for COP26. But reflecting on

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the two weeks of intense climate negotiations at COP26 in Glasgow it's clear that, while real progress was made, it was nowhere near enough.

COP26 President Alok Sharma had urged negotiators to consign coal power to history," but that didn't happen as the more coal-reliant countries refused to stop using coal until the 2040s or later.

Countries also failed to make significant progress on climate finance. The UN Environment Program estimates that developing countries need $70 billion per year for adaptation, and this figure is expected to double by 2030. So poorer nations renewed their calls for financial help from richer nations to adapt to the effects of climate change.

With this small amount of progress, reaching the 1.5C degrees mark by 2030 seems a bit too far off. Pledges for future action pose a high risk of failure, because so many countries have to agree to them. Too much action is needed by too many countries to reach this goal. In my opinion, COP26 will have to either extend the deadline of reaching 1.5C, or abandon the project altogether and create a new one. Some things are just too far out of reach. But if many countries agree and cooperate to achieve this goal of 1.5C, it might just be salvaged.

Manato Iizuka Tohoku University Do you think limiting the global warming below to 1.5 degrees can be achieved by 2030? Why or Why not?

I don’t think limiting the global warming below to 1.5 degrees can be achieved by 2030.

Between 2018 and 2020, the Earth's temperature will have increased by 0.22 degrees Celsius. However, 0.1 degree Celsius of this increase can be attributed to improvements in forecasting technology. In other words, we can assume that the temperature rose by 0.12 degrees in the two years between 2018 and 2020. This means that even if the rate of increase does not change, the temperature is expected to rise by 0.60 degrees Celsius in 10 years’ time, in 2030, and since the average global temperature as of 2020 is estimated to have risen by 1.09 degrees Celsius, the additional 0.60 degrees Celsius will bring the temperature to 1.69 degrees Celsius in 2030.

If the rate of increase in global average temperature between 2020 and 2030 is less than 0.1 degree Celsius, we can achieve less than 1.5 degree Celsius in 2030. However, I believe that in order to achieve this, technology must develop at a higher speed than at present in order to become carbon

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neutral. Currently, EVs are considered important and the world is moving to promote their use.

However, at present, the CO2 emissions associated with the manufacture of EVs is about twice that of gasoline cars. Also, we have to rely on thermal power generation to generate electricity, which emits CO2. In addition, the spread of EVs will require the spread of large charging spots.

The construction of these facilities also emits CO2. And I believe that these problems will still be unresolved in 2030. Livestock production is another area that accounts for a large part of the current greenhouse gas emissions. It is said that if we leave the food system without any other crops, the temperature increase will exceed 1.5 degrees Celsius by 2050. It is also a fact that about 1/4 of the earth's land area is used for this livestock farming, reducing the forest. In order to solve these problems, we need to use artificially cultured meat, trends that do not consume large amounts of meat (such as spreading veganism), or better use the greenhouse gases emitted to generate electricity. However, I predict that these too will not yet be established in 2030. As a result, even if CO2 emissions are reduced in key areas, CO2 emissions are increasing in other areas, and as a result, I don't think we will see a significant reduction in CO2 emissions by 2030.

Therefore, I believe that the rate of temperature increase will not decrease significantly, and there is a good chance that the temperature will increase by 1.5 degrees Celsius in 2030. I also think that we are getting close to 1.5 degrees Celsius, if not exceeding it.

Maxine Angelica J. Dela Cruz University of the Philippines Rural High School Education amidst the Pandemic: A Privilege or a Right?

Since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, the progress to achieving quality education has been pushed back further. School closures emerged worldwide that ranged from 5 months to nearly a whole academic year. The learning losses of students increase and so are the dropout rates. The biggest cause that hinders education equality nowadays is the lack of resources and immediate action of government leaders because these are essentially needed to put education reforms back on track.

According to INQUIRER.net in late 2021, the Philippines is reported to be the last country in the world that has yet to resume face-to-face classes. In the second year of remote learning, there are 2 million students who are still not enrolled in the country. The main challenge that students and teachers continuously face is internet access. Distance learning requires the use of digital devices such as smartphones, laptops, and desktops; however, families with low income and people living in unfavorable conditions lack most of these resources, which hampers a student’s education.

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Others reach great measures to accomplish school tasks. A college student had to climb a mountain towards the nearest internet signal to submit his homework. Teachers from Zambales crossed rivers only to deliver printed learning modules to their students. Most residents in rural areas rely on mobile data, meanwhile some teachers pay their expenses on data consumption for teaching online. These situations are enough to show how much effort must be taken for education to improve not only in the Philippines but worldwide.

Although the reopening of schools in the Philippines shed hope and light for all during December 2021, it was not until the Omicron variant surge happened. The hope was gradually decreasing, but at the same time, more opportunities were knocking as adolescents and kids started receiving their vaccines to prevent the virus. There is a blurry line at present as to why the government is allowing people to enter places for entertainment including malls, arcades, and amusement parks, but not for educational institutions. These government leaders and policy-makers should also consider concrete plans for students to safely resume physical classes. In that way, the learning losses of students could be restored when they go back to school.

The global pandemic divided social classes, and this ultimately affected education. Education is becoming more of a privilege than a right when it should be the other way around. That is why world leaders should prioritize programs and implementations that would bring back a better learning environment for students, teachers, and the community. No student deserves to be left behind.

Naphatjutha Rajatabhothi Saint Gabriel's College Disarmament and Peace Disarmament means to abolish weaponry from normal firearms to nuclear weapons to chemical weapons; presumably to bring peace. But to put it into an easier way I view it, imagine 2 people beating up each other with metal sticks. Disarmament means to break these metal sticks to render them unusable or make the sticks hurt less. I believe that this act of disarmament is kind of pointless. To clarify, let us go back to the metal sticks scenario. What if those people, with their sticks broken, picked up more sticks? It is a continuous act of new weapons and breaking them again over and over. It will never bring true peace.

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Nhật Anh Trang Nguyễn Doan Thi Diem Secondary School Research on peace and the role of disarmament The definition of peace is “the concept of societal friendship and harmony in the absences of hostility and violence”. To apply the definition of peace into separate groups of stakeholders, I dissected the definition into two groups, i.e. citizens and government. For citizens, peace is the ability to access equal justice concerning human rights. For governments around the globe, peace is the ability to share the same goals and achieve them without conflict. The goal of peace is, purely, the well-being of our society’s sustainable development.

The world we live in is constantly evolving: new ideologies are being formed every day, and with that comes continuous challenges to avoid conflicts. When we, as individuals, find ourselves in times of dispute and rage, we are likely to become dangerously violent, because we can. The same appears to occur on an international scale. However, as our technological capabilities increase, adverse weapons are created. So threatening are they that from trying to solve a problem, we create a million more problems along the way.

Nations get violent because they can. This incentive inspired Immanuel Kant, a German philosopher, to create the concept of disarmament. As countries demand the need for weapons to defend themselves, total disarmament is therefore impossible to pursue. Its hindrances notwithstanding, disarmament has proven exceptionally significant in terms of nationwide politics.

The first role of disarmament is ensuring citizens’ rights. According to article 6 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), on the right to life, it stated the “entitlement of individuals to be free from acts and omissions that are intended or may be expected to cause their unnatural or premature death, as well as to enjoy a life with dignity.” Weapons capable of mass destruction are incompatible with respect for the right of life, proving disarmament’s vital roles, due to 2 points: 1. Weapons of mass destruction cannot be, spatially and temporarily, controlled, resulting in high chances of both combatants and non-combatants having unnatural or premature deaths 2. Chemical weapons, for instance, Agent Orange, are capable of causing unwanted deformities on survivors, leading to discriminations between humans all around, violating humans’ rights to “enjoy a life with dignity.”

As stated in my definition of peace, I believe that peace among countries can be pursued when they share the same goals and have no conflicts. Disarmament wipes countries of the ability to get

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violent. Once world leaders stopped seeing an incentive to create an arms race or creating a war, their attention would more likely to be diverted into the matters at hand.

An aspect that is seriously affected by the development of weapons and the possibility of wars is none other than the environment. Airstrikes, artillery, and other means of weaponry have a tendency to target industrial facilities and significant properties, which has long-lasting ramifications for populations and habitats. The damage of these aforementioned facilities can lead to chemical spills, land and water contamination, air pollution by oil spills, etc. To avoid such disasters, disarmament must be regarded as an efficient measure to prevent such events from happening to the Earth.

A Report on the State of Children’s Rights Concerning SDGs no. 4, 5, 6 During recent years, countries around the world have suffered from COVID-19 and struggled to get back on their feet. Every aspect of our lives has been, more or less, affected by the pandemic.

However, the age bracket that is the most adversely affected by this pandemic is undoubtedly children, with their education and health suffering detrimentally and endangering their future. In this essay, I will highlight the conditions of children’s rights globally through SDG no. 4 - Quality Education, no. 5 - Gender equality, and no. 6 - Water and Sanitation.

A plethora of fallouts for children is tangible concerning education. In 2015, the worldwide number of children out of school dropped by almost half. With COVID, however, 20 years of progress might have been wiped out. An additional 101 million (9% of children) from 1st to 8th grade fell below minimum reading proficiency levels, and participation in school or education courses has also dropped significantly. It is either due to having no access to education or struggling to obtain a good education through online alternatives, matters are undoubtedly going to deteriorate.

Concerning gender equality, children have also been affected immensely. Financial difficulties have been a serious aspect of COVID impacts, thereby making it a burden for women to care for unpaid domestic care work. This affects the mindset of equality, especially for children in underdeveloped countries. Furthermore, children (due to online studying) are subject to online platforms every day, leading to exposure to inappropriate sexually abusive content, which may include misogynistic stereotypes, etc.

Even though sanitation plays a crucial role in preventing COVID-19 from spreading, especially in school institutions where every classroom is crowded with students, a 2020 UNICEF study found that one in five schools had no sanitation facilities, and nearly half lacked basic handwashing facilities. This makes COVID cases spread silently in institutions, affecting children’s health.

The problem concerning the worsening state of children’s rights can be ameliorated provided both young children and adults alike take certain measures to promote children’s rights. For the government, constant content about the current state of the youth with the addition of calls for

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respect towards children’s rights should be mentioned on popular and inclusive media platforms namely the radio and the TV. Educational institutions can also offer a helping hand by holding meetings for both parents and students with the intent of educating about children’s rights and warning about online exploitation. Educators or even students can work together to create informative content through well-known platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, etc. in order to reach pupils and peers and raise awareness about matters at hand. Ultimately, children around the globe should be encouraged to take part in children’s grassroots groups, in which they can pick up useful skill sets in life together with making an impact on promoting children’s rights in their own communities.

Parvani Akhilesh Chaman Bhartiya School Education Inequality and COVID-19 “Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world“, but when the world itself got attacked by a powerful weapon COVID-19 the entire worlds school operation was disrupted by the pandemic.

The challenges thrown by the pandemic and cycles of lockdown was homeschooling, cancellation of internal assessments, public exams and it affected child’s social life and learning methods.

The problems faced was that the child did not get the same support of teacher as in offline classroom teaching. School closure had a large impact on learning time particularly for slow learners. Learning from home depends on a lot of factors like wifi connection, virtualcommunication devices, silent learning environment, parents’ time and motivation to learn. But not every child has easy access to wifi, laptops etc. Some has to rely on smartphones which intern had an adverse effect on their focus in the class which can also lead to lack of eyesight. Through online platform it is difficult for the teacher assess the child’s learning level.

How can we reduce the biggest cause to this inequality? We can provide all schools the ability to support remote learning like proper network connection and see that every house ; rich or poor has devices or tv to use as a mode of education. Those places which doesn’t have access to network connection like remote areas, should have tv at their houses where classes can be telecast for children to learn. We can also conduct assessments after each chapter to understand the child’s learning progress.

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Even though 70% of the children are back to school now, we should have all the technological facilities at home, school, office etc. to face any uncertainty, which will always be a boon to the society.

Pham Tran Bao Chau Delta Global School Can we achieve the Paris Agreement’s goal?

The average global temperature has risen more than 1.1°C since the Industrial Revolution, resulting in massive and severe consequences. As a response to this crisis, a treaty on climate change - the Paris Agreement - has been made, with global leaders aiming to limit the temperature rise to below 1.5°C by 2030. Considering the current situation, it’s unlikely that this goal will be achieved.

The rationale is simple. We must deliver cuts in total global emissions of 7.6% per year throughout this decade in order to meet the 1.5°C goal in 2030, according to Inger Andersen, UNEP’s Executive Director. However, we have never been even close to achieving the 5% CO2 cut, let alone the 7.6% global emission one.

To be fair, however, there has never been a high chance of us being able to meet this target, which is why it’s set as a global goal in the first place. The problem lies in the fact that time is rapidly running out and the odds are increasing. The World Meteorological Organization - a specialized agency of the United Nations - stated that in the next five years, the probability of the annual average global temperature temporarily reaching 1.5°C has doubled from 20% in the last decade to 40% in 2021.

On the bright side, many governments and unions have made formidable and reassuring promises.

For instance, the EU promised to reduce net greenhouse gas emissions by at least 55% by 2030.

In April 2021, the Biden administration pledged to cut U.S. emissions in half by 2030 compared with 2005 levels. But although many political leaders have displayed such great ambitions in reducing their carbon footprints, there hasn’t been any concrete plans or policies. By way of illustration, governments aspire to increase the use of renewable energy, but precisely how they will take a leap from the current 24% of renewable energy to 50 or 60% in order to keep the 2030 goal alive still remains unclear.

In 2020, due to social distancing, huge progress has been made in terms of reducing greenhouse gas emission. Unfortunately, the emission rate has started rising again since 2021, undoing all the

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progress we had made. One lesson can be drawn from this, however, is that we need decisive, quick, and large-scale actions if we want to increase the chance of meeting the set target.

We might have already missed our last chance to avoid reaching 1.5°C in 2030, especially if this stagnancy continues. Nonetheless, if we give up now and not take any action whatsoever, we will fail by default. It’s always better to do something than to do nothing since each and every action counts.

Seoyeon Choi Korea International School Jeju Climate Crisis, We Haven’t Put All the Cards Down Yet. Climate change to climate crisis. Paradoxically, as people hear more about climate change, they were less interested about the change in the Earth, and the phrase, “climate change”, was no longer able to reflect the seriousness of the environmental change. Then, people started to call “climate change” as “climate crisis” and made different actions to raise awareness about changes in the environment. For example, in 2019, there was even a campaign called, “Call it a Climate Crisis”, which is a campaign that urges major news and medias to call climate change as climate crisis (“Call it a Climate Crisis Campaign”). Despite those actions and efforts, just as people became more and more ignorant of the phrase “climate change”, they will also become ignorant of the phrase “climate crisis”, which will render all the efforts people have made so far in vain. However, thinking about the fact that only few people have actually taken actions on climate change so far, and the fact that policies haven't reached everyone, we still have a chance to protect our earth. Therefore, limiting the global warming below to 1.5 degrees can be achieved by 2030, if everyone can sincerely participate in the actions for the climate change.

First of all, what is climate change or climate crisis, and what have we done to reduce the speed of change? Climate change and climate crisis are the terms that describes the global warming and its impact on earth. Then, there were many actions people took to reduce the climate change: “increased use of renewable energy (wind, solar, biomass) and combined heat and power installations; improved energy efficiency in buildings, industry, household appliances; reduction of CO2 emissions from new passenger cars; abatement measures in the manufacturing industry; measures to reduce emissions from landfills” (“Climate Change Policies”). Also, in 2021, the United Nations organized 26th United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP26) and made contracts to keep global temperature below 1.5 degrees Celsius (“UN Climate Change

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Conference”). Still, it was not enough to stop the increasing temperature, and actually, the “average global temperature in 2021 was about 1.11 (± 0.13) °C above the pre-industrial (18501900) levels” (Nullis).

Then, who were the people who took those actions? Although the actions of the companies are more influential than the individual’s actions, individuals were more encouraged to reduce carbon emission and protect the environment. There are different reasons why individuals were more encouraged to take actions than the companies. First, it is easier to change one’s action than the company’s action. Compared to one’s action only requiring the change in his or her mindset, company’s action requires longer process to mediate all the factors. Also, those actions are financially burdensome since it requires more consideration during production stage. For example, it requires better ingredient, technology which would make the product more expensive, which might lead them to lose some costumers. Then, as companies notice those burden they have to bear to protect the environment, the companies that has to make profits for their maintenance would not be able to start their actions toward climate actions. Even for the companies that are taking the actions nowadays, the purpose of their actions became more of business plan rather than the sincerity to protect the Earth. Specifically, there actions toward climate change were no more than a business plan to accumulate future consumers that are interested in eco-friendly companies. Then, consumers are aware of this too, so companies that actually has policies about environmental protection are not very impressive and touches their heart. This means, eco-friendly policies and plans are already losing its influence and would not be able to reflect the seriousness of global warming soon.

Nonetheless, if a perception that consideration of environment does not harm the business can be built among the society, more companies will join in the actions to protect the environment. One of the reasons why environment-friendly businesses are financially burdensome is because it requires high technology as it was stated before. Then, as more and more technology gets developed, there will be less financial charge made for the companies, making companies able to take on challenge to implement environmentally friendly policies. Until then, the financial support of the government or official organizations are needed to start the change for the companies. For example, these days, electric car market is one of the largest market that drives the economy.

However, since producing an electric car requires lots of money to buy resources, invent the technologies, and test the safety, not many companies are in that field actively. It is true that it requires lots of money, but if they can also acknowledge how much they can gain out of that business, there will be more companies trying eco-friendly businesses. Naturally, as more people experience successes with eco-friendly policies and business plans, their perception of ecofriendly business is not efficient would change into how considering environment is worth to try in their business.

So far, most of the actions were made by individuals. However, the companies have more influence in the environment, so it will be more efficient to make change in companies from now on. Specifically, if the perception among people about ecofriendly products and policies require

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lots of money can be solved with financial support and the development of technology, the rate of change in global temperature will decrease. Eventually, it will be possible to limit the global warming below to 1.5 degrees Celsius by 2030.

Seungwoo Baik Lighthouse International School “Verum Pax” Peace is a term that all humans in the world in the present want to live by. But although everyone wants to live in peace, it is very hard to obtain. The reason why I think peace hasn’t been able to be obtained is that everyone has a different perspective on the definition of peace. Some people may think peace is achieved through teamwork with others and harmony, others may think peace is obtained when he or she is alone. But the real debate comes in when weapons are discussed. Some countries propose that peace is obtained through the strong national defense and the ability to protect their own country and its people while other countries think disbarment is the key to making peace. The problem is counties that say that weapons are needed have military powers that surpass the amount of power needed to just keep their country safe, while most other countries do not even have enough for national defense.

Just a few days ago, Russia attacked Ukraine, starting the latest war in human history. Just like the other wars that we have seen in textbooks, buildings are blown to ashes through missiles, and soldiers and civilian casualties have been, is, and will increase as time goes on. This war has not only created a huge crack in peace between Ukraine and Russia, but it has sparked a deadly tension between the biggest superpowers in the world: the USA and Russia. Yes, the probability of a “World War 3” or a war of worldwide capacity is not that likely as of now, war is something no one can foresee. And if global conflict starts between these superpowers, it may most likely lead to nuclear forces being used all around the globe. The consequence of a nuclear war would be the destruction of countries and civilizations, extreme radiation around the globe, and the disruption of global climate change that will lead to maybe even the end of humankind. And because of these critical possibilities, the disarmament of nuclear power is crucial in world peace.

Yes, it is true that developing a non-nuclear world is very hard, as the countries in possession do not want to let go of their biggest weapon. There are people who propose nuclear weapons are the very aspect that keeps a global war from occurring, but as we have seen in Ukraine just a few days ago, this may not be true. But if every country, organization, and person in the world agree that

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nuclear weapons should be disarmed and countries reduce their military powers to a minimum, world peace can be achieved and every nation and country in the world would become free from the fear of nuclear conflict. Releivement from this life-threatening stress alone will make people be at ease, allowing treaties and negotiations between countries much more smooth and without duress, making this world not just a peaceful world but an equal one as well.

Works Cited ICAN. “Immediate Effects - ICAN.” International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons, https://www.icanw.org/catastrophic_harm_immediate_effects. Accessed 3 March 2022.

ICAN. “Impact of Nuclear Weapons.” International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons, https://www.icanw.org/catastrophic_harm. Accessed 3 March 2022.

Novak, Analisa. “The risk of Russia's Ukraine invasion: "I just hope this is not the beginning of World War III," says Rep. Michael McCaul.” CBS News, 24 February 2022, https://www.cbsnews.com/news/russia-ukraine-ww3-risk-michael-mccaul/. Accessed 3 March 2022

Sippakorn Wongsaming Saint Gabriel’s college The role of the youth in the SDGs and how the youth could contribute to enhance the children’s rights worldwide I think we can all agree that SDGs are important by putting ourselves ready for learning and studying would help achieve SDGs the youth’s role are learners, student I might say we must make ourselves ready for everything because whether right now we are learning online or not we have to prepare. Example is if you study online you may have to technology to learn but did you concentrate to it. This is the question so the youth need to prepare while the adults or parents prepare the technology for studying or stationaries.

Usually, we do think that the technology is the main part of learning at this point but we can all agree that the youth or ourselves played the big part on this studying method. The students not only are important in this studying method but the normal ways of learning as well because the one that is studying isn’t the computer not the television nor the phone.

It is us the student who learns it is us who gain the knowledge through any studying method, so we are the ones that have to concentrate as I pointed out these things maybe we can stop take a

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look at others thing such as stationary technology internet computer and, take a great look at ourselves, the learner the student. If we all do the same thing by improving ourselves and maybe we could’ve learned the thing that we never could do whatever we once couldn’t because, right now we are prepared.

Last thing about the children the adults such as your parents should be the one that prepare it for you because it is their duty so they have to prepare it just like when we prepare for our duty such as learning studying. Therefore the parents also have their own duty so they will need to prepare about it as well. Thank you for reading.

Sooa Cho Changjo International Christian Academy Authentic peace through disarmament Weapons, including guns, cannot bring or maintain peace.

However, some people mistakenly believe that they must guard peace against others by using arms. Dr. Sam Richards’ lecture at Penn State University can be a proper example. He compared the U.S and South Korea, where guns are illegal, to illustrate how each country views firearms. Some American students of his class believe possessing a gun gives them more security and that guns are a means to defend themselves. Koreans, on the other hand, oppose guns as they consider them unnecessary and harmful to others. In my opinion, the possession of arms is not true peace but temporary silence due to anxiety.

According to J.H. Newman, peace is freedom from disquieting or oppressive thoughts or emotions which represents that disarmament is the key to achieving peace. Weapons cause a threatening atmosphere and instigate people to have guns to protect themselves from others’ arms. However, if everyone does not own a gun, no one has to possess a gun or be threatened by others. To be specific, any equipment meant to defend or counteract an attack is unnecessary when the threat has passed. This is a logical conclusion in countries where gun ownership is illegal. When it comes to the world, disarming the entire country not only puts an end to war but also eases global tension.

Eventually, it will lead to a peaceful world with everyone longing for it.

To summarize, peace refers to a condition that does not involve any threat or any causes for it.

Further, disarmament nurtures peace by removing perilous environments such as those created by weaponry such as firearms, bombs, and tanks. People are thus free from insecurity and the possibility of war. Real peace will be achieved when all the potential precariousness is eliminated through eliminating ordnance from all countries.

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Thanh Thảo Phan Việt Ú c (Vietnam Australia International School) Does disbarment define peace?

The legal term “Peace”, sometimes referred to as the King’s peace or the Queen’s peace is the common-law concept of the maintenance of public order. However, peace can mean several things, either if it is “freedom from disturbance” or “a state or period in which there is no war, or a war has ended.” Then where does peace come from? What stops us from obtaining peace, is it not having disbarment? This will further be discussed down below.

Personally, peace to me differs in different levels. One way, Peace usually is the state of mind where I feel at ease, with no disturbance or any type of annoyance whatsoever, which means I could freely do what I want. In other meanings, I acknowledge peace on a wider scale. It shows when people of all ages feel safe under their own home that they don’t have to dig for food. That they share equality.

Nowadays, weapons are considered as a justice holder or a peace menace. When talking about polices, in several countries they carry gun as a justice defender. Those protectors are known to go around and seek for crime. In severe cases, they are allowed to use their guns. However, in Vietnam’s recent years, there are people called “The street’s knights”, who assure the safety of citizens without the act of weapons.

From another perspective, without the act of disbarment, in countries such as America has have several gun shooting at school or even around the neighborhood block; specifically 316 people per day. Due to having access to stores, websites and even guns at home, people started to put them in negative usages. On November 30th 2021, Ethan Crumbley; a 15-year-old had access to a gun and took the life of 4 students. The parents are accused of allowing this behavior, so if they were disbarment, would the situation differs? I surely would agree.

Furthermore, freedom might mean to take away your own life. Many people, including students or middle-aged men/women feel suppressed under the pressure of their own lives. In 2019, 23 941 Americans passed away due to firearm suicides. Even though using that weapon and not having disbarment to them might be freedom, the consequences left behind might crumble the rest; including families, friends, and peers. In this case, disbarment doesn’t bring “us” freedom, but rather a barrier for us to not suicide. With the suspension from your law license, you won’t be able to purchase such beings.

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Overall, disbarment is defined as a punishment for unethical or crime conduct but may also be imposed for incomplete or incapacity. When in wrong, a person needs to be corrected. The victims need to be assured with freedom, with the ability and chance to walk freely without fear. So, in my opinion, disbarment, or punishment for those under acts of crime, abuse, violation, cruelty is undoubtedly needed for achieving peace, if not; for a closer step to peace.

Trần Nam Sơn THPT Phan Đình Phùng What do you think is "Peace"? What is the main role of disarmament in achieving peace?

Peace for me is polarizing and diverging, peace for somebody could be about being happy and satisfied with the reality. For others, it could be having a silent and stress-free life. While for the majority of countries, peace could mean economic stability, cheerful citizens. On the other hand, some countries are ready to go to war to get peace rather than being bullied while others choose to harmonize rather than risk the lives of innocents.

But why is the “meaning of peace” so unstable and fickle?

Individuality might be one of the answers. We are different individuals with different priorities, with different approaches towards a specific problem, so what is “peace” to you might not be the “peace” that others are looking for. I’m not writing these to criticize mankind, but rather to point out a sad phycology fact that we cannot take control of. Without a doubt, humans are distinctive species, we are what happens when the instinct of an animal is stuck with the consciousness of a god. We are constantly evolving, changing and adapting to new environments but sadly, we still need comforts, pleasures and our own selfish needs. Therefore, coming up with a fantastic and realistic solution to create peace doesn’t mean governments or countries will approve or even agree to think about it- that is the ugly reality.

Guns and weapons might bring victories but that doesn’t mean they could bring true peace. This is when disarmament kicks in with a simple goal: “To bring peace,” disarmament which is an act of reduction in the military weapons that results from the maintenance of international peace and security by creating mutual trust could be one of the answers to bring us one step closer to what is world peace. Despite having different political and world views, I believe and know there is always a way to bring some form of peace to the table and I think what blocking us from achieving peace might be able to tell through the connection between history, culture and the way our brain functions.

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Yewon Park Korean International School of Bangkok Hurry! Save the Earth!

Climate change is occurring due to global warming these days. Climate change is getting worse and worse.

These days, we have to wear a facial mask because of COVID-19, but the mask is disposable and made of plastic, which has had a worse impact on the environment. However, tourist attractions in many countries had severe environmental problems due to the garbage thrown away by tourists, but thanks to COVID-19, the garbage problem has improved.

To solve these environmental problems, the 26th meeting “COP 26” was held at the UN, where talks were made about whether the temperature would rise 1.5 degrees by 2030.

I think it's about how people decide whether the temperature will rise 1.5 degrees by 2030. There are eight years left until 2030, and in those eight years, we can do something good to environment or bad. I think more people can save their precious environment if they avoid things that are difficult to recycle, and use sustainable clothing, and reuse or recycle objects.

There may not be much time left to live on Earth. There may or may not be a "second Earth."

Earth is the most suitable place for humans to live, and we should protect our precious Earth.

Hurry, save the Earth!

During the pandemic, children's right have to be promoted.

SDGs goal 4 is about education. During the pandemic, children can’t go to school everyday. If children stay home everyday, their behavior and emotions may deteriorate.

Because of pandemic, children can’t go to school but, they also can’t play outside a lot. There’s no right for play and there's no right for study.

To protect children’s right in COVID situation, children can study home, and do online classes or make them go school once a week and make them play with their friends.

Children’s right should be promoted every time, every day. Even there’s COVID.

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Yu-Chien Chang Cheongna Dalton School Obstacles for Educational Equality SDG 4 aims to “ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all”. Despite this goal, it is an obvious fact that education equity and equality are far from being achieved globally, with COVID-19 making the situation no way better. According to the World Bank, in 2020, 94% of students, 1.6 billion children, were forced out of school globally due to the pandemic (“Urgent, Effective Action Required to Quell the Impact of COVID-19 on Education Worldwide”). This led to the more prosperous populations pursuing private or online education, while the less fortunate population with no technical devices was left neglected with no education at all, worsening the educational inequality on a severe global scale. Then what are the fundamental factors that hinder education equality? Poverty, gender inequality, and warfare.

It has been proven by multiple researches that higher levels of education almost always lead to higher future income and prosperity (Wolla and Sullivan). Yet, children from poor areas often struggle for survival, and cannot afford to be educated, forced by their financial situations to rather work. Globally, there are a total of 72 million children neglected from being schooled due to poverty, with about 32 million from Sub-Saharan Africa and 27 million from Central and Eastern Asia. Poverty branches out into thousands of different effects, destroying the learning opportunities of individuals in various ways. The unfairness in learning opportunities is severe in more prosperous nations as well, but cases are incomparably more severe in areas with extreme poverty. In Sub-Saharan Africa, more than half its children receive less than four years of schooling, and in Somalia, more than half the children receive less than two years of schooling (“Right to Education: Situation around the World - Humanium”). Regions with extreme poverty often cannot fund education on their own, and therefore, need aid from foreign organizations.

Students need a suitable learning environment including schools and classrooms, and the lack of these environments causes overcrowding in limited areas. For example, in Malawi, there are normally around 130 students in every classroom. Overcrowding leads to additional problems including the insufficiency of learning materials. In Tanzania, only 3.5% of sixth-grade students own reading textbooks, and in Cameroon, only one out of eleven primary students own textbooks, often causing those students to be forced to share their materials. Other than textbooks, worksheets and notebooks are always lacking in supply in the poorest countries. The lack of resources ultimately forces students to study in unsuitable environments, likely end up with jobs with low income, and be disabled from ever escaping the chain of poverty.

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Another major cause of educational inequality is gender inequality, especially against girls.

UNICEF’s goal of girls’ education is more than just providing schooling opportunities, but also ensuring that girls feel safe in their learning environments and supported in pursuing their careers (“Girls’ Education”). Education for girls declines child marriage and child mortality rates, and even raises girls’ future income rates significantly. Despite these advantages, “129 million girls are out of school, including 32 million of primary school age, 30 million of lower-secondary school age, and 67 million of upper-secondary school age” (“Girls’ Education”). Girls’ education is less valued especially in the LEDCs, due to poverty, child marriages, gender-based violence, or just a traditional favor for investing in boys than girls.

The last major cause of educational inequality is the insecurity caused by wars and terrors.

In regions under threat of wars and terrors, educational environments are often destroyed and children are more vulnerable to violence. During war times, many teachers and intellectuals flee the country to reach safety, and naturally, students lose their educators. In fact, a total of “75 million children have had their education disrupted by conflict or crisis” (“10 Barriers to Education That Children Living in Poverty Face”). Children in these warring regions are robbed of their opportunities for education, and for sure, do not have their rights and equality for education.

Poverty, gender inequality, and insecurity from wars cause children to be denied education and hinder the equality of education. Poverty leads to the lack of resources to provide education, gender inequality takes away the opportunity of education from girls, and war insecurity leaves children vulnerable to violence and interrupts the education of many. COVID-19 further affected educational inequality, especially in the financially unstable LEDCs. The education system is the poorest in the developing or less economically developed countries, and foreign aid must be provided for the children in these regions to be educated.

Yunseong Kim Korea International School, Jeju Disarmament and Peace 1) What is Peace?

Before we start talking about how disarmaments main role in making peace, let’s get into the meaning of peace. So what is peace? Peace is a relative term that has a lot of meanings. First, Peace is a time of period when we are free from civil disturbance. Second, peace is a state or period of mutual concord between governments. Meaning

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that a time when the governments are not fighting. When nobody is fighting. When everything is peaceful without weapons without fighting. All calmed down. Having a period of rest. Lastly, peace is also a pact or agreement to end hostilities between those who have been at war or in a state of enmity. Let’s say that two countries A and B were fighting. When nobody can win, they stop and make a pact. That time, when they are resting in peace. When nothing big like wars are happening. For example, Korea is currently at peace after the battle with North Korea and South Korea started. On the other hand, Ukraine isn’t at peace since it is at war with Russia. This is what peace is.

2) What is the main role of disarmament in achieving peace?

In the text above, we learned about peace. But peace can be only made when there are no tensions. No tensions can be made with disarmament. No weapons between some countries.

That’s where disarmament comes in. So disarmament is the act of reducing, limiting, or abolishing weapons. So if a country keeps keeping nuclear weapons, the country is in peace against that country. Will be terrified and not be able to keep the peace around them. Because they know that that the other country can attack whenever they want. They know that they are in danger that this is going to be happening soon enough to them. This happened. There was a time of peace until the Russian government started making kinds of nuclear weapons. The peace stopped and the other countries issued sanctions until the Russian government stopped. For example, let’s say that there is a country named A, country A has nuclear weapons that threaten you. To keep the peace, most countries would order them to disarmament. That is the main role of disarmament in achieving peace.

Save the Children!

Save their EDUCATION! COVID-19 has been ruining the children’s lives. Since they can’t get the education that they need these days. The innocent children are not having enough education. Being restricted by COVID19. We can’t do most of the things that we were able to do when we were studying. We can’t just not hear any lessons. We can’t just stop school either. So what will be the best solution for this?

Today I will be presenting one solution to help solve this problem.

My solution is to turn things in an Online sort of way. We do everything online when we do virtual school since we don’t have any way to fix this. If we change it that way it would be much easier.

To support this, there are a lot of examples where schools use “The English Quiz” to take tests online, helping us to take tests in Online school easier. Schools who used that said that they were able to catch up on their work easier and to enable them to see how they did every day.

Furthermore, schools have issues with finishing the same amount of tasks that they do in person.

If we change these tasks into activities on apps such as Seesaw, it will all be done easier than in "normal classes." Helping us get everything we need to be done right away. If we use this, not

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only will we be able to Finish the work that we need, we will also be able to finish more than we can do in normal classes.

All in all, if we follow this, we are going to be helping the innocent children who don’t get their suitable education, to help them improve even more both academically and mentally. Therefore, this is why we should turn activities into online tasks.

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Grand Award Yu-Chien Chang, Cheongna Dalton School “This conference provided me a perfect opportunity to share ideas globally with people around my age to develop ways to make this world a better place.”

From its very beginning, this program emphasized the importance of debating. The conference participants concluded that we, as a youth, needed to debate in order to learn to project our ideas, adopt others’ opinions, and develop independent thinking skills. Though it only lasted for three days, the Global GLEC Conference 2021 drove me one step closer to those major benefits of debating.

I participated in the Global GLEC Conference 2021, and thankfully, was honored for the Grand Award. Though I cannot deny the fact that I was thrilled to be recognized, my excitement was not born from the simple happiness of being awarded, but rather from the realization that what I have been voicing for the last three days have actually been significant and made an impact on the minds of others. I have always been fond of giving my opinion on a topic I was passionate about and making a positive change in society, and this conference provided me a perfect opportunity to share ideas globally with people around my age to develop ways to make this world a better place.

This conference was divided into mainly three parts, including academic debates, SDGs group discussions, and speaker sessions. Out of the three activities, I enjoyed the academic debates the most. I engaged in the academic debate for topic 1: education inequality and COVID-19 as part of the opposition side. I was in charge of the rebuttals, and though the whole process of planning for the debate was a bit challenging and rather stressful, I was amazed at how intense the debate flowed.

I loved how both the proposition and opposition teams structured their arguments logically so that I could clearly see the unbiased pros and cons regarding the topic. Looking back, I think all three events of this conference, including the debate, were a wonderful experience that helped me mature and enlarge my ways of thinking.

This was my first time attending a Global GLEC Conference, and I am so thankful for being provided this opportunity to learn from all the great speakers. Just as its title, Global Leaders English Challenge, stated, this conference seemed to be successful in sprouting young minds into future global leaders.

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Excellence Award Kazandra Alexis Morallos, Santa Rosa Science and Technology High School “It was no doubt a place where young minds can hone leadership and critical thinking skills while engaging in healthy discussions among likehearted representatives of our generation.”

Global Leadership English Challenge provided an open and learning conducive environment where the youth was encouraged to convene their standpoints on timely issues whilst promoting unity amidst diversity in cultures and beliefs.

The special lectures, headed by profound speakers, enlightened us on a new perspective with regards to the current dilemmas the world is facing and could possibly face in the future. The event also gave us a platform to openly share our opinions without fear of prejudice and dismissal, through academic debates and group discussions.

The conference, just like the previous years, has once again proven and highlighted the significance of the youth’s role in society. It was no doubt a place where young minds can hone leadership and critical thinking skills while engaging in healthy discussions among like-hearted representatives of our generation.

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Excellence Award Geon Hyeon Kim, Jinsan Middle School “I wish this program can become more known so that more students who will lead our future can grow to be great people” Hi everyone, my name is Geon Hyeon Kim from the Republic of Korea. Thank you for giving me this wonderful award. I participated in the Global GLEC Conference 2021, which was held from 11 March to 13 March 2022. At this conference, all of the participants shared ideas about a big topic, “UN and New Challenges”. We have done debates, and discussions and listened to many lectures, and have lots of questions about it. All of the sessions that I participated in this conference were very helpful, as they made me think deeply about international issues a lot. To explain about the sessions, I had a debating on the topic of “Disarmament and peace”, the motion was “Do we need to be armed for national security?” During this debate, we learned not to just blame another side, but to make rebuttals with logical points, and had a think about serious problems. Furthermore, there was also a simulation of negotiating internationally on climate action as community leaders.

This simulation made me think about other countries’ positions and made me understand others more. Not even these, there were a lot more sessions that made participants learn about the UN and the right way that our future should be heading. I got the award for participating in this conference, but I believe all the other participants were wonderful at sharing their ideas bravely, and I thought they had a great will to become a person who can lead the global society. Again, thanks a lot for giving me this wonderful award, and I wish this program can become more known so that more students who will lead our future can grow to be great people.

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11 Mar. 2022 (Day 1) •Opening Ceremony – Welcoming Remark• •Jin-Hoan Choung, the current President and Head Director of Hope to the Future Association•

UN Virtual Tour – Asia and the Pacific from the Perspectives of the United Nations• •United Nations Guided Tours Team•

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12 Mar. 2022 (Day 2) •UN Briefing – New Challenges in the International Society• •Dr. Abraham Joseph, Chief/Senior Socio-Economic Affairs Advisor of the United Nations•

• Academic Debate 2•

•Career Development Session – Why is Youth Education Important• • Dr. Kenji Yokoyama, Dean of External Relations NUCB Business School•

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•Side Event•

•Career Development Session – Studying Abroad and International Admissions to NUCB• • Freddy Mason, Office of international Admissions NUCB International College•

13 Mar. 2022 (Day 3) •COVID-19 Special Session – Global Cooperation for the Post-COVID-Era• •Dr. Kadir Jun AYHAN, Assistant Professor at Graduate School of International Studies Ewha Womans University•

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•SDG Group Discussion•

•Quiz Competition•

•Closing•

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ORGANIZATIONS

Hope to the Future Association Status

www.hopetofuture.org

NGO Representative at the United Nations Department of Global Communication (UN DGC)

Program

Youth Education Programs and Sponsor Programs supporting the United Nations and its works, Global Citizenship Education Development, and Sustainable Development Goals (SDGS) in both domestic and international level

Website

www.hopetofuture.org

Email Contact

webmaster@hopetofuture.org +82-2-6952-1616

Hope to the Future Association (HFA) is a non-profit organization registered under the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Korea. HFA has acquired the status of an associated NGO with UNDPI in June 2014. HFA is deeply committed to supporting youth around the world. Our core value is sustainable support, voluntary participation, international partnerships, and empowering youth.

Main Programs

(1) UN Headquarters Training Program in New York and Geneva  Youth UN Training held at the UN Headquarters in Geneva and New York  Attending Lectures by UN High Officials and International Organization Experts such as the Secretary-General of UNEP and the President of General Assembly  Build Professional Knowledge on the SDGs and Global Issues that the UN mainly deals with  Discussion with the UN Ambassador of the Republic of Korea

(2) Global Youth Forum on the United Nations – ‘Academic Forum on the United Nations’  The forum is a pedagogical four-day program that aims to improve the degree of understanding and professional knowledge on the UN and the role of International Organization.  The theme of the forum is ‘Sustainable Development Goals and Peace’

(3) Donation Campaign for Children in Africa - ‘Container of Hope’  Sending 40ft long container to African developing countries filled with translated English books, shoes, school supplies gathered from donation campaigns raised by students

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Sponsors Ritsumeikan Asia Pacific University

en.apu.ac.jp/

Under the principles of “Freedom, Peace and Humanity’, ‘International Mutual Understanding’, and the ‘Future Shape of the Asia Pacific Region’, APU was established on April 1, 2000 with the aid of Oita Prefectur, Beppu City and a range of organization and individuals from Japan and overseas.

APU’s philosophy is to create a university campus that produces graduates with the skills they need to contribute to international society based on the fundamental principles of Freedom, Peace and Humanity, International Mutual Understanding, and the Future Shape of the Asia Pacific Region. With almost half of the faculty and student body comprised of foreign nationals from all over the world, the University has achieved a truly international campus environment of cultural coexistence.

APU has been one of the biggest sponsors of Hope to the Future Association since 2013.

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Publish Date

13 March 2022

Publisher

Global Leadership English Challenge

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