The YMUN team’s Holiday photo.
The second article in the YMUN Featured Series, this post – written by Director General of Administration Alessandra Powell – discusses the innovative strategies and ideas YMUN is using to expand its conference and bring the best possible experience to its delegates. Ranging from a new iPhone app to a partnership with Kiva Microcredit, YMUN is pioneering new business strategies for conferences, while still ensuring that the satisfaction of its delegates remains its primary goal.
This year YMUN has set a new bar for business and administration in areas ranging from nearly quadrupling financial aid to new tech innovations that will make YMUN XL bigger and better than ever. YMUN has pioneered an iPhone app available in the App store that has many uses ranging from allowing advisors to track payment progress to providing restaurant recommendations to sending push notifications when rooming changes occur. YMUN’s Breaking Boundaries Award, and our increased budget for individual financial aid have enabled more students than ever to attend YMUN regardless of cost. Undersecretary-General of Domestic Delegations Hannah Gonzales and her Assistant-Secretary General, Angelo Pis-Dudot, have piloted our financial aid efforts, reaching out to target schools across the country and providing them with tailored preparation help and guidance as they plan and train for committee. YMUN strives to bring together the best delegates from top delegations around the world, and our efforts at expanding financial aid are perhaps are largest step this year in that direction.
In that vein, our Outreach Team, comprised of Undersecretary-General Clarey Zhu and Assistant Secretary Generals Linda Oh and Adam Gerard, has nearly tripled our presence in social media, gotten press coverage around the world, and secured more sponsorships than ever before. After identifying where YMUN’s presence was weakest, the Outreach Team targeted these areas, yielding YMUN’s most international conference in history. Furthermore, the amount of sponsorship funding that has been secured in 2014 yielded a whopping 2,500% increase. This funding has been used to allow for our expansion in financial aid, and to increase the quality of Yale Day.
The Conference team has put together a phenomenal set of opportunities for delegates to experience Yale. Ranging from lunch with Yale faculty to a micro-credit bazaar, this year’s delegate activities are all woven together by our theme this year: Think Globally, Act Locally. Under-Secretary General Christina Wong and Assistant Secretary Generals Hannah Sampson, Caroline Posner and Nicole Ng have put together a schedule that hopes to engage and inspire delegates outside of the committee room.
Assistant Secretary General of Administration, Sejal Vallabh, has been piloting our partnership with Kiva Microcredit. YMUN will be donating 5-10% of it’s profit this year to Kiva, and delegates will also be encouraged to participate through candy sales and more during the conference. Kiva is a well known and respected non-profit that has given out nearly $500 million in microfinance loans since its 2005 date of inception. Kiva distributes loans (with a nearly 99% repayment rate) to various entrepreneurs. YMUN’s project is unique in that each committee will be paired with a different project to create as personal an experience for the delegates as possible.
We can’t wait to see you at YMUN XL, and hope that you leave our conference with many new friends, knowledge gained, and a renewed sense of wonder at what you can do in this world. YMUN is focused on inspiring delegates and we hope that through our social projects and unique opportunities, we can empower our YMUN XL delegates to return home with a renewed sense of community spirit. YMUN doesn’t begin or end with the sound of a gavel, its impact will continue through the delegates it inspires.
