Armed with fabric, scissors, and sewing machines, members of Arcadia’s Model United Nations club met in the Castle recently to sew new international flags to hang on campus and refresh several others that were damaged. The students worked on new flags for countries such as Bangladesh, Dominican Republic, Kyrgyzstan, and Syria–each requested by a current student–and are continually sprucing up damaged and worn flags for countries such as Armenia, Austria, and Lebanon.

“Having these flags from all over the world is a very visible, tangible, illustration of the fact that we are a welcoming community; Arcadia is global, and we welcome the globe,” Dr. Angela Kachuyevski, professor of Political Science and faculty advisor for the Model U.N. club, said. “Collectively, too, the students are invested.  They see the flags around campus and know that they had a hand in creating a beautiful and welcoming space for all.” 

Over the past several years, the club has kept an eye on the condition of each flag hanging on campus to see if and when it needed to be cleaned, repaired, or replaced. There are many reasons why a flag would need to be replaced, and the club wanted to ensure they did not miss one. They also took note of which countries were not represented.

“We’ve walked around the campus looking at the flags that are either sun damaged, green from weather, or just torn up and we marked those down to try to revive,” said Abigail Sandala ’26, president of Model U.N. and a double major in International Relations, Diplomacy, and Law and in Criminal Justice. “Then there are also international students that are part of the club, so we wanted to make sure they had representation too.”

Mofazzal Hossain ’23, ’25M, who is studying for his master’s degree in International Peace and Conflict Resolution, is one of those students. Hossain realized that the Bangladeshi flag did not hang on campus, so he wanted to remedy that. 

“I have been here a long time, and I did not notice my country’s flag hanging, so I asked Dr. Angela, and she invited me to this event to make it,” Hossain said. “Now any future Arcadia students from Bangladesh can see this and feel welcome.”

Victoria Fallouh ’25, a Politics, Government, and Law major and director of training for Model U.N., explained what the flags represent.

“ We’re trying to show how diverse our community is, all the students and their backgrounds,” she said. “We also have flags for each country Arcadia students have studied abroad in, as well as flags to represent students from other colleges and universities that have studied abroad with Arcadia programs.”

For Fallouh, it was important to ensure the Syrian flag, now known as the independence flag, is displayed on campus because that is from where her family hails. 

“When I came and toured campus, I noticed there wasn’t a Syrian flag,” she said. “So, for future Syrian students, it will be a beneficial addition. Also, given my major, I like advocating for peace in the world, and this is just one small way to do that.”

Each flag presented a different level of difficulty for the club, but they weren’t deterred.

“We’ve developed our skills over the last couple of years,” Kachuyevski said. “Still, some of the flags are a challenge, but they are important, so even if we have to YouTube it to figure it out we’re going to get them done.”