Joining the Ranks: Do Colleges’ Academic Rankings Translate into MUN Success?

While there are many compelling reasons to participate in Model United Nations, there is no denying that awards are a very strong motivating factor for numerous delegates and teams. As Best Delegate’s Fall 2013 North America College Rankings hit our screens this week, many readers are no doubt wondering, “What makes some schools better at Model UN than others?”

One potential explanation of a college’s success in Model UN is the academic strengths of the school. It seems a logical assumption that schools with stronger Social Sciences (namely International Relations or Political Science) programs will perform better at MUN than schools whose strengths lie elsewhere.

Comparing the just-released Best Delegate rankings to the list of schools that Foreign Policy and U.S. News have identified as the top ten Political Science and International Relations programs (in the USA) tells a different tale, however.

Best Delegate’s Fall 2013 Rankings recognize the following schools as being the ten best schools at Model UN:

1. University of Chicago

2. Georgetown University

3. Harvard University

4. University of Pennsylvania

5. Florida International University

6. United States Military Academy at West Point

7. Claremont McKenna College

8. Columbia University

9. Yale University

10. Rutgers University

Meanwhile, the list of the top ten International Relations and Political Science programs in the USA (synthesized from Foreign Policy and U.S. News rankings) identifies these schools as being consistently at the top of the Social Sciences game:

1. Harvard University

2. Princeton University

3. Stanford University

4. Columbia University

5. Georgetown University

6. Yale University

7. University of Chicago

8. Dartmouth University

9. George Washington University

10. American University

As you can see, there is a decent amount of overlap between the two lists. However, there are also some glaring inconsistencies. Harvard, Columbia, Georgetown, Yale, and University of Chicago, all make the top ten of both lists, albeit in a different order. The other half of each list is entirely disparate.

Five of the schools on the Foreign Policy and U.S. News list do not make the cut for best Model UN teams.

Princeton, ranked #2 for its IR/PoliSci programs, only makes the top 50 on the MUN list. It is ranked #1 on U.S. News’ list of best colleges in the USA.

Stanford fares better, clocking in at #23 on the list of best MUN teams, although this is still a bit low given its #3 ranking for Social Sciences. It is ranked #5 on U.S. News’ list of best colleges in the USA.

GWU is in a similar situation, listed at #9 for their IR/PoliSci programs, and at #15 for their Model UN performance. It is ranked #52 on U.S. News’ list of best colleges in the USA.

American, which rounds out the list of the best Social Sciences programs, only makes the top 75 MUN teams. It is ranked #75 on U.S. News’ list of best colleges in the USA.

Most surprisingly, Dartmouth, which is ranked a solid #8 for its IR/PoliSci programs, did not even make the top 75 on Best Delegate’s list. It is ranked #10 on U.S. News’ list of best colleges in the USA.

On the flip side, where do the schools that make the MUN list but not the best Social Sciences programs list stand academically?

University of Pennsylvania has Finance as its most popular major of 2012, with 14% of the student body choosing this major. It is ranked #7 on U.S. News’ list of best colleges in the USA.

Florida International University’s most popular major of 2012 was Business, Management, and Marketing, pulling in 35% of the student body. Its national rank was calculated but not published on U.S. News.

United States Military Academy at West Point had 23% of its students majoring in Engineering. It is ranked #17 on U.S. News’ list of best colleges in the USA.

Claremont McKenna College appears to have a strong Economics focus, with 30% of its student body selecting this as their major. It is ranked #9 on U.S. News’ list of best colleges in the USA.

Rutgers University had a wider distribution of majors, but Psychology took the lead at 13%. It is ranked #24 on U.S. News’ list of best colleges in the USA.

Given these stats, it would appear that overall academic excellence at a university may have more impact on its Model UN performance than superiority at specific Social Sciences programs. There are, of course, myriad other factors that can influence and impact a school’s Model UN performance. Training regimens, geographic location (which, in turn, may dictate the conferences a school attends), size of the delegation, committee assignments, and countless other variables can all play a role in shaping a school’s success at MUN. Keep in mind that even when the utmost effort is made to make rankings objective, different organizations have returned different results, and there are many intangible factors that cannot be computed well when formulating these lists. For this reason, at Best Delegate, we take rankings as a good gauge of a school’s MUN performance, but not as the hard and fast definition of MUN success.

Looking for tips on delegate strategy, ideas for team training, or ways to improve your individual or team performance in the new year? Take a look back through our posts of 2013 and check out our Resources page here: https://bestdelegate.com/resources/.