Students gathered across the world, to several sites for a competition challenging student in Public Policy and Management. These global sites were Maastricht, New York City, Washington D.C. area, Indianapolis, Bogotá, Tempe, Seattle, and Beijing. NASPAA is a global public service membership association network for graduate schools offering programs in Public Affairs, Administration, Policy and the like.  The annual competition offers students an opportunity to interact as global leaders, the web based module creates a ‘game-like’ experience to position students in a series of world events, participants react and strategize to steer their country through particular regional challenges. Hunger security was the theme for this year, UN’s Sustainable Development Goal 2 to end world hunger, achieve food security, improve nutrition, and promote sustainable agriculture by 2030 was the basis for this competition.

We worked in teams trying to lead our region to better health, economic opportunity, developed infrastructure and crop diversification. In our roles we evaluated the information provided, which came in the form of complex categorized numerical data stats, with a lot of room for interpretation and application.

Developing strategies and filling these various roles was a unique experience that taught me some of the factors involved in establishing and working towards complex world goals, as well as the global and regional compounding threats and how they impact populations and systems. The experience was beneficial and challenged me to weigh confounding factors, compete on a variety of scales and gain new understanding for work done by organizations like the UN.

I loved meeting students from different programs and professions, the networking event hosted by UW really enhanced my understanding of the variety of programs and specializations available. I appreciated this opportunity to meet and learn from a diverse range of students from across the Pacific North West.

The MPA student participants from TESC pictured from left to right include Ulysses Martin, Ryan Keith, Jamie Milletary, and Nicole Vukonich