MUN

Top 12 Model UN Conference Scheduling and Market Trends in 2011-12

by KFC on May 5, 2011 · 14 comments

The Texas team travels to conferences around the world

This is not your typical Top 10 Weekends article. It can’t be – we launched the Best Delegate Model United Nations Conference Database 2011-12 yesterday but many conferences have not announced their dates yet. Instead, this article is for the MUN junkie who wants a bird’s-eye view of scheduling and market trends in the Model UN community.

What are the power-packed weekends? When should teams visit the UN or travel abroad? Which regions are growing – and where is Harvard expanding to next? Read below to find out!

Top 6 Scheduling Trends

1. November 10-13 is shaping up to repeat as the most popular weekend.

SSUNS is one of many conferences on a popular weekend

This was the most popular weekend of the entire season in 2010 with a total of 11 conferences being held. Four large high school conferences – McGill SSUNS, Rutgers RUMUN, Brown BUSUN, and UCLA BruinMUN – as well as the SUSMUN conference in Atlanta are already scheduled to take place this weekend in 2011 (it’s Veterans Day weekend in the United States). Iberian MUN in Portugal is also on this weekend. William & Mary’s WMHSMUN and U. Penn’s UPMUNC college conference chose different weekends this time, but we’ll see if Stanford SMUNC, Penn State PHUNC, and the Northwest MUN college conference decide to battle for market share here.

2. Harvard MUN, Ivy League MUNC, and THIMUN Hague are sharing the same power-packed weekend again in late January.

THIMUN overlaps with HMUN and ILMUNC

Harvard HMUN and U. Penn’s ILMUNC are two of the largest and most competitive high school conferences in the world, and both have shared the same weekend ever since Harvard moved their conference from December to January. However, both conferences seemed to hint that sharing the weekend didn’t hurt attendance last year – Harvard drew 2,900 delegates and ILMUNC saw 2,200 delegates attend. The dates for the THIMUN Hague conference – the largest in the world – overlap both of these conferences as well, making this a power-packed weekend with “championship”-level implications.

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Announcing the Launch of the 2011-12 Model UN Conference Database!

by KFC on May 4, 2011 · 0 comments

Today is the launch of the Best Delegate database of Model United Nations conferences! It’s a lot more global and comprehensive than the one we had for the current school year, and we hope you will find this resource valuable in finding and selecting conferences to attend. If you are new to MUN, you can read about our tips to choosing conferences. If you are already familiar with the circuits, make sure to check back tomorrow for our analysis of the calendar and market trends. This database will be updated weekly and conferences may submit updated dates and information here.

The actual database is under the “Conferences” page (bookmark or check back on that page frequently), but we’ve provided quick links for you here:

College Conferences:
North America | Europe | Asia Pacific | Latin America, Middle East, and Africa

Middle School and Elementary School Conferences:
Global

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Do Certain Colleges Value Model UN More Than Others?

by KFC on November 30, 2010 · 34 comments

One of the goals of Best Delegate is to help high school students use Model UN to get into college. We released a free e-book, How Model UN Can Help You Get into College, wrote 10 Tips on How to Write your College Application Essay, and talked about 5 Ways to Show Leadership in Model UN.

Several days ago, Ryan and I were having a discussion about college admissions and college rankings when I brought up an interesting question: Do certain colleges seem to value Model UN more than others?

University of California, Los Angeles

Part of my inquiry was derived from a 2009 press release I saw from my alma mater, UCLA, where Model UN was mentioned next to many other prestigious accomplishments of admitted students:

UCLA, the most popular campus in the nation, with 55,676 freshman applicants, announced today that it had admitted 12,098 prospective freshmen for fall 2009.

Among them were 175 student body presidents; more than 150 National AP Scholars; 400 most valuable players in their sports; nearly 900 outstanding musicians; almost 300 Eagle Scouts and Girl Scout leaders; more than 200 black belts in various martial arts; some 500 Science Olympians; about 500 recipients of book awards from Harvard, Yale, Cornell, Princeton and other universities; more than 150 Model United Nations delegates; more than 150 recipients of Rotary Youth Leadership Awards; and 3,000 who indicated they were captains of their sports or academic teams.

UCLA seems to value Model UN. But does it value it more than USC? How about when we compare the University of Chicago with Northwestern? Or Michigan State and Illinois-Chicago against their respective state flagship rivals? And how do Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Stanford, and Penn stack up against each other?

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