THIMUN Qatar Global Act with Impact Awards, G.A.I.A.s

In the United Nations, the work doesn’t stop at the debate; once a resolution has been passed, all member states then works towards what has been decided. Appropriately, THIMUN Qatar has worked to become a platform for global impact and change. In such spirit, as part of our MUN Impact initiative, this year’s THIMUNQ conference will host the first ever GAIA (Global Act with Impact Award) contest. All schools attending THIMUNQ will be able to participate. Participants must attend THIMUN Qatar in order to be eligible to compete.

What are the GAIAs?

The GAIA contest is a competition in which participating teams, representing their school, will produce a service project that works towards a UN Sustainable Development Goal and the indicators within it. The ‘service project’ would vary in scale depending on the school’s delegation size, resources available, and other such factors; we understand not every school has access to the same amount of resources, and this will be taken into consideration in the judging process. The general aim is to engage the students with the issues of their community and for them to make a real impact in bettering those issues. For example, a team which has chosen SDG 12, ‘Responsible Consumption and Production’, may choose to do a project in which they promote recycling and do weekly cleanups of their community; however, we encourage creativity!

How to submit your school’s GAIA application

THIMUN Qatar 2024 GAIA Application Form

We ask that submissions are in the form of a 5 minute video together with supporting documents that show the scope of their work. A board of judges will select the top 3 teams, whose videos will be played in the closing ceremony, and the top winner will be awarded a prize by THIMUN Qatar.

Deadline: 17 December 2023

2023 finalists

Birla Public School

GoCoEquality

Birla public school created an awareness program within their school community to develop plans for achieving SDG 10: Reduced Inequalities. Students included all aspects of the community, including school admin, teachers, students and support staff to suppor their public awareness campaign, which can be found on instagram on @go.co.equality

Qatar International School

Project CommUnity

Through food drives and other activities, Qatar International School’s student-led MUN club encourages the school community to get involved in helping out people of less privileged backgrounds in Qatar. Such groups of people include migrant labourers and women, all of whom we have reached out to in the past. Since 2021, QISMUN have held school-wide food drives which aimed to collect food products that would be sent off to a certain target group in order to contribute to achieving SDG 1, No Poverty, and SDG 2, Zero Hunger. In 2021, this target group was migrant labourers, thus addressing SDG 8, Decent Work and Economic Growth. The following year, it was families and women, addressing SDG 5, Gender Equality, which is why feminine hygiene products were also collected. This year, a food and book drive will be held in April to collect educational resources for children in addition to food for their families. We have also met up with the children our donations will be benefitting, in early February to engage them in enriching activities, primarily art and sports, to address SDG 3, Good Health and Wellbeing. For the past few years, we have collaborated with the local organisation, WAHAB, to facilitate the distribution of goods we have collected and to also get in touch with the target group. The aim of this project is not just to provide food for the less fortunate part of the community in Qatar. It is also to encourage a sense of unity across the country and to foster a sense of responsibility for students, parents, and teachers to help out as much as they can if they are able to. We hope to inspire people to make contributions to society, and to also inspire them to hold donation drives as they are simple, yet very beneficial.

Delhi Public School – Modern Indian School, Doha, Qatar

Move!

The Qatar National STEPwise Survey (2012) reported that only 11% were getting the daily vegetable intake, 17% the fruit intake, and 15% the wholegrains intake recommended by the dietary guideline. Children are simply not getting proper nutrition and enough exercise, especially after the pandemic. The two main reasons for this being: firstly, a lack of awareness, and secondly, a resistance to healthier habits that are perceived as difficult and boring. We wanted to show that exercise could be fun and that healthy food didn’t have to taste terrible! Our initiative is based on Sustainable Development Goal 3: Good Health and Well-Being. Our main audience comprised middle school and high school students. The organizing team consisted of 8 people led by Azhar. Vaibhavi and Daiwik helped Priyanshu with marketing and outreach. Vaidehi coordinated the sports activities and games. Leen provided refreshments and a brochure containing healthy recipes. Azhar baked a healthy, but delicious Snicker bar. Daiwik arranged supplies for the cleanup. Abid offered technological support and filmed the entire event, while Priyanshu helped with creative film direction and video-making. Zaid supported the ideation process. We got 45+ participants from diverse backgrounds. The day started off with icebreakers, warmup sports activities and games like dodgeball, volleyball and football, followed by a walkathon. They were offered healthy homemade Snicker bars and were taught how to make them at home by themselves. Then they cleaned up the park and the teams were tasked with collecting as much trash as they could with a small prize for the winning team. As the day drew to a close, we offered healthy refreshments. We cleaned an 88 hectares-large park and gathered 25 bags of trash which improved the experience of future visitors and lessened the burden on park maintenance staff. The park officials and locals encouraged our efforts. The participants felt a sense of community and an understanding of the joy in the service of others. We empowered our community to keep their surroundings clean and keep themselves physically active and healthy.

Previous winners of the GAIAs

THIMUN Qatar GAIA Winners 2023

THIMUN Qatar GAIA Winners 2022

THIMUN Qatar GAIA Winners 2021

THIMUN Qatar GAIA Winners 2020

Resources

Please see the THIMUN Qatar GAIA Booklets below that guide you step by step through creating your own SDG service project, or please see our student created blank booklet:

https://qatar.thimun.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/Student-project-guidebook.docx