2016 ESMOAS Prepares Students for Diplomatic Greatness

SAN ANGELO, TX - The Eugene Scassa Mock Organization of American States, (ESMOAS), provides an environment for students to learn about diplomacy as they represent countries assigned to their universities. This year marks the 20th anniversary of the academic conference. 

“We get many students, both from the U.S. and abroad, who are studying to become career diplomats," said Joshua Hyles, program director of ESMOAS. “They get hands-on experience with crafting international legislation and working 'across the aisle,' and the ability to network with current career diplomats who come as our guests.” 

Hyles mentioned some of the benefits he believes students gain from attending ESMOAS help them further their goals in any future career.

“The best part of this program, in my estimation, is that there are as many positive outcomes as there are types of students who participate,” Hyles said. “ We have, as a result, had dozens of students go on to careers in federal, state, and local government, as well as with the Foreign Service and the OAS itself.”   

He noted that students who aren’t looking for political careers still gain valuable public speaking experience, mastery of debate and parliamentary strategy, and learning to work within a group with set parameters and time frames.

Andreas Chavez, an ASU student who attended ESMOAS last year, gave his perspective on attending the conference.

“ESMOAS gave me a good perspective on how international organizations work,” Chavez said.  

He added that getting to see how countries would interact with one another in these discussions provided him with a new outlook on the political process.

“It shows you why it can take so long for countries to pass legislation with the many different opinions that are present in the committees,” Chavez said.  

Chavez was part of a committee that addressed Hemispheric Security at last year’s ESMOAS. He presented a resolution to create a security network to prevent international terrorism from occurring.

“I’m always amused, in a good, respectful way, by the laser-focus of students presenting resolutions,” Hyles said. “ For our judges and our program staff, the resolution is really just the vehicle through which we hope to teach students about networking and furthering their diplomatic goals.”

Hyles said students learn through researching their topics prior to presenting their work at ESMOAS.  

“[For] each student who spent a semester researching and writing the resolution, it's personal,” Hyles explained.  “It's a piece of their soul--sometimes a representation of their hard work and what they've learned--and they are uber focused on getting [the resolution] passed.”

He noted that part of the process comes from making sure those present in their committee all agree with the principles behind their resolution.

“I always enjoy when I hear [students] talking about the unexpected difficulties they experienced getting [their resolution] to pass,” Hyles said. “I know that, whether they realize it or not, they probably learned a lot more about the process when they had to "slug it out" over their resolution, compared to simply having it be passed by consensus without any challenge.”  

Originally, ESMOAS started in 1995 and was known as SAMOAS (San Antonio Model OAS). It was hosted at several San Antonio area universities (UTSA, Trinity, Incarnate Word, St. Mary's). It was also a regional outgrowth of the national Washington Model OAS, which started in the 1980s.

“The founder of the program, Ambassador Eugene Scassa, brought the idea from Washington, DC to San Antonio after joining the faculty at St. Mary's University," Hyles said. 

Ambassador Scassa served as a lifelong officer in the Foreign Service at many posts, including as U.S. Ambassador to Belize and the Assistant to then UN ambassador Madeleine Albright. 

"He was instrumental in starting the program, and was present as a judge and mentor for the first 15 of our conferences. After his death in 2012, we elected to rename the program after him.”

Hyles has been the Program Director of ESMOAS since 2011. This year’s convention will be held at Texas State University from Nov. 3-5. Angelo State, Baylor and Texas Tech are some of the Texas schools that will be present at this year’s conference.