Letter from the Secretary General-
Welcome to the 14th annual Washington Area Model United Nations Conference (WAMUNC)! WAMUNC, hosted every March by the George Washington University and the GW International Affairs Society, is one of the premiere high school Model United nations conferences in the United States. As such, WAMUNC has been able to touch high school students lives for over thirteen years now and now it is time once again to craft and create an amazing conference that has become nationally recognized as one of the best run, and most unique conferences in the country. Now in its 14th year, WAMUNC doesn’t go to a hotel to debate; we want our delegates to get a taste of the college experience while in the middle of all that Washington, DC has to offer. Our staff of over 100 student volunteers always delivers a high level of performance and energy to ensure that the conference delegates and advisors have an amazing but educational experience.
This year WAMUNC XIV is proud to continue the rewarding tradition of success and interesting committees which vary from our venerated international institutions of the United Nations to functional simulations of peace negotiations and crisis simulations. Delegates will take on roles ranging from diplomats to reporters and NGO representatives to cabinet members. WAMUNCs history of innovation has allowed the conference to test unexplored territory for Model UN and expand beyond the dated models of other conferences.
Not only that, WAMUNC utilizes the ideal location of GW in the hub of all things DC to educate delegates further. Our true, ‘Paris of America’, constitutes one of the most international cities in the world. Excursions are led by staff into the city to explore the cultural, social, and political institutions that our city holds, in addition to briefings, speeches, and addresses by leaders in the fields which interest the students.
WAMUNC though would be impossible to run without the dedicated volunteer staff which make WAMUNC a success. Every year, the secretariat of 10, rely on the staff of over 100 to be the face, energy, and devotion that always makes WAMUNC a success. WAMUNC XIV is no different, so we will be looking to our staff to provide that same high caliber that has come to be expected of WAMUNC. The opportunity to go behind the gavel and to guide the discussion is always among the most rewarding and positive experiences that Model UN is able to provide. Our staffs come from around the nation and around the world and represent every major continent. Their perspectives provide the variety and flexibility which has made WAMUNC a profound success.
WAMUNC is primarily an educational conference, focusing on bringing the varied viewpoints of the world and teaching students the value of alternative patterns of thinking. By taking students out of their own shoes, and placing them in someone else’s; having them research the history, life, and realities of another, it allows their minds to be opened to much more than could ever have been conceived otherwise. Ellison Onizuka, the first Asian American to go into space said that, “Every generation has the obligation to free men’s minds to look at new world’s…to look out from a higher plateau than the last.” WAMUNC is one small part in the attempt to free those minds, to allow them to view other ways of life and realities of others. That knowledge can radically change the world; change that can propel Reason forward and the ideas of Progress enshrined in the United Nations Charter that we must, “save succeeding generations from the scourge of war…[and] promote social progress and better standards of life in larger freedom.”
-Bryce Jarvis
Secretary General