Talk:Model United Nations/Archive 1

Awards

Maybe it should be mentioned in the section about awards that it's just American MUN's that do this? I've been to 12 MUN's in Europ so far (and one in Turkey) and none of them had awards.

Canada's MUN has awards. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 154.20.108.119 (talk) 05:35, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

Individual Delegations

Due to this being a fairly controversial section, I feel the criteria for being mentioned should be winning overall best delegation, or various outstanding delegations consistently over the last five years, at the largest and most prestigious conferences. The few I have listed fulfill the requirements of this standard. If anyone wishes to add another, please list the awards this delegation has won. I would also like to point out that awards are a minor part of the Model UN experience in terms of significance, but also a commonplace one, especially when one looks at the above mentioned conferences.Credulouscit 01:26, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

I really do not think that any schools should be mentioned in the article. "Success" in Model UN is ultimately student-driven and therefore highly variable over time, making the inclusion of such very unencyclopedic. There are also a great number of point of view and conflict of interest issues at hand, some of which you even preface the list with. Even at the moment, your edits fail to mention Father Judge High School which won UNA-USA last year. The list also completely excludes the west coast and southeast US circuits, as well as the collegiate circuits, and any foreign conferences. Please, someone back me up in that this list should be removed. Mystache 22:44, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

I'm in agreement with Mystache in that no specific delegations need be mentioned in the article. I've watched this article for awhile and seen quite a few instances of self-promotion. Really, we need a general [[rule of thumb[[ for when it's appropriate to include the name of a conference or delegation within the text, and I motion for never. This article should be about the MUN experience in general. --Columba livia 01:13, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

While I understand your points, I feel that this is an important point, and one of encyclopedic value. Due to the competitive nature (either unfortunately or not depending on your point of view) built into the experience, leaving out success would be akin to writing a football article and not mentioning superbowl winners. In response to the arguement about the East-Coast issue, the east coast circuit contains the largest conferences (both in terms of schools and delegates). Schools from across the country attend as well as a plethora of international schools as well. Due to my relative inexperience in the Collegiate MUN circuit and international, if such a consistent run of success exists in either, I think it should be duly noted. In response to the Father Judge High School, while the victory is impressive, it doesn't fulfill the requirements mentioned above. If it continues its success at other conferences over an extended period of time, it will assume its place on the above list. You make a valid point that success is student driven, hence an occasional victory is not of interest. However what makes these streaks important is their longevity. All five of the schools currently on the list have fielded highly successful teams, as per the specifications listed above, for at least five years, and most more than that, all do this with student run teams without outside training or coaching. Credulouscit 03:49, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

I don't think that your football analogy holds weight in this argument, primarily because the football article does not contain a list of super bowl winners. Moreover, simply listing "successful" east-coast high schools is not categorically encyclopedic. To continue the dreadful analogy, it would be like having a paragraph at the end of the history section saying the Indianapolis Colts, Dallas Cowboys, and New York Giants are good football teams. If you insist on having some sort of list of "successful" mun teams, please make their own articles or make pages for the respective conferences and list your HS as the winner in certain years. The editors of the community at large will decide whether or not that is notable. I think there is already consensus that it is not. Feel free to check WP:N to see why. Asserting your school's mun team's notability, or the notability of a team of school you know, I think, does this article a disservice. Mystache 17:58, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

I take your point (though the colts aren't really considered an east coast team). If an article were to be written on the topic of East Coast style Model UN, would you consider it to be appropriate? I hate to use the football analogy again, but if one goes to the NFL page, it clearly lists several times champions and successful teams. Credulouscit 15:46, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

I think an "east coast style" or a "west coast style" article would run afoul of WP:OR. To my mind there hasn't been any non-anecdotal, verifiable, non-WP:COI research about "styles" of MUN (assuming for the moment that there is such a thing). The most universally-recognized guides to MUN are those put out by UNA-USA, and I don't think they get into any detail about styles, competitiveness, etc. To the extent that there are any notable differences in the way certain conferences are run (like the totally different approach taken by the YMCA MUN conferences), those can be mentioned in the main MUN article. Wl219 01:03, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

Another Suggestion

Could somebody find a list of NGOs these are vitally important to MUN resolutions, and seem to be unable to find a website that provides a list of them, if you could link to it at the bottom, or start up an article of MUN NGOs that are worth noting that would be greatly appreciated. Cheetoian

See Category:Non-governmental organizations for NGOs that have their own articles on WP. There are literally too many NGOs of varying missions, sizes, politics, and geographic foci to list them all. Wl219 01:07, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

Suggestion

I'm an avid debator from Syosset, and I've noticed that while Chicago Lab, Dalton, and Highland Park are mentioned in the article, the Oceanside High School is not included. Perhaps someone should consider adding their respected MUN program to the list.

All the best, Sean

Well if you do that you might as well add all of the MUN programs around the country... or even the globe! ((Ronald Reagan High School included :D))

Article needs work

I've added a POV Check to the article. I feel the article needs a good deal of work to get it back to NPOV. I did a little work on the "headers" (or lack thereof) but it still needs work. I have no clue how to approach the subject, particularly the double entry thing (???) so I'm hoping someone else will be able to. Reene (リニ) 12:51, Nov 16, 2004 (UTC)

I've removed a couple of sentences from the reson for participation section that were too general and very POVed. The rest still has a bit of an advert feeling to it, but nothing serious IMO. I do not see anything in the #2 entry that has not been mentionned above. Should we just delete it? Alfy 04:51, 2 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I'd say remove the second entry, yes. Or remove whichever one is less informative/more POV. After that is done I can do some tweaking to the paragraphs so they sound a little less rah-rah. Reene (リニ) 19:05, Dec 2, 2004 (UTC)

OK, a bit of destructive editing here, I removed the second entry. I'll be away for a about a week, but I'll have another look at the article when I come back. It does not look THAT bad, tough. Alfy 01:27, 3 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Good article, but I'm not sure for the reason to include different committees that have been done in various conferences; Considering some conferences do historical committees, and how difficult it would be to track the committees in different conferences, the section serves little purpose.

68.100.151.102 20:44, 9 October 2006 (UTC)Can anyone tell me who founded the Model UN?68.100.151.102

POV Check

I removed the POV Check because I do not really see a POV problem. I did remove the link to the SouthMUN page that was taken down due to copyright issues.

I put back the POV tag because the entire last paragraph of the Participants section has major POV issues. "An inner circle of teams ... has come to dominate"??? Give me a break. Wl219 04:29, 1 July 2006 (UTC)

Wikify tag removal

I removed the wikify tag. It looks wikified to me. --CDN99 02:13, 18 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Redirected AFDed article

Westchester Model United Nations Conference had an AFD that agreed to redirect the article here. I couldn't find any material of worth to merge, but more knowledgeable editors are free to dig in the article's page history. Johnleemk | Talk 11:59, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

Claims need verification

This article claims that the two largest Model United Nations conferences are The Hague Invitational Model United Nations (THIMUN) and the Harvard Model United Nations (HMUN), and claims they both host over 3,000 students. The HMUN website, www.harvardmun.org, claims only to host over 2,000 students, and to the best of my personal knowledge, the NAIMUN conference, www.modelun.org/naimun is larger than HMUN. My assertion obviously need validation, but at the least, I am certain that the current assertion is incorrect.

Several references are made to a "MUN International," which I cannot find referenced anywhere else on the web, and does not appear to exist as a legitimate organization. The publication referenced also appears not to exist.

• I think "MUN International" is really American Model United Nations International [1]. Mystache 04:11, 25 April 2006 (UTC)

Cleanup

Looking at the article, it seems as though the content needs to be refocused. There is a lot of repetition in the material and it seems that references to specific conferences are bordering on vain. Mystache 04:09, 25 April 2006 (UTC)

MUN Wiki

Hey,

There's a Model UN-specific Wiki (http://www.munfo.com). Should this be incorporated into this article, and where?

• I can't reach that Wiki and I can't find it on Google either, so I guess it's no longer available.

Deivo (talk) 22:57, 19 November 2007 (UTC)

Needs More Work

Additional items that need correction or clarification: The NMUN (National MUN) in NY is a college conference and thus should not be directly compared to the high school conferences. The National High School MUN (NHSMUN) also in NY, is probably the largest of the US based conferences, with attendance at over 2,000. While sometimes recognition is given to delegates at MUNs for the quality of their work, there are no "winners;" such a concept is, in fact, recognized as detrimental to the quality and accuracy of the simulation by the better conferences. Moreover, no particular group of schools "dominates the MUN circuit." While, for example, the 30+ year history of the NHSMUN has seen various schools send high quality delegations for periods of several years, the very nature of the conferences shows a constant changing of the guard. All in all, this article needs work, fact checking, and a more balanced approach. -Danny Weiss, 26 June 2006.

• While I'd agree with you on the first part of your statement, the issue of awards is not true. With the exception of NAIMUN, the largest conferences, HMUN and ILMUNC both give individual awards, and all three give out delegation awards, with trophies and certificates of merit, as one would at an athletic event. While the benefits of this may be questioned, the facts show that it occurs regularly. Also domination does not need to occur over a set period, say 30 years. Looking at the past 5-10 years, the same small group of schools have taken the vast majority of delegation awards at the largest conferences. 24.199.119.21 04:44, 7 March 2007 (UTC)Nick Hurwitz 3/6/07

Further suggestion

I did MUN for 10 years, so I definitely come into this discussion with my own biases. However, I do think the external links section is way too long. It would be better to start another wiki article called "list of MUN conferences," along with "list of MUN clubs/organizations," if we were to make an effort to mention everybody. Additionally, there's no mention of crisis/security simulations where the emphasis isn't so much on writing and large group speaking but rather small group collaborative problem solving under intense time pressure. To me, these were the most fun simulations I participated in, toward my later years. Also, there's no mention of MUN in popular culture, such as the "Das Bus" episode of the Simpsons or the Olsen twins' film "Winning London." Finally, I do think there is a potential POV issue with the heavy emphasis on Huntington Beach, Dalton, et al. Why mention just these schools when there are tens of thousands of students at hundreds of schools doing MUN across the country? Wl219 21:40, 28 June 2006 (UTC)

• I totally agree with everything you've said. I've moved conferences to the list... article and I've removed the POV youve noted but both resurface over time. Perhaps a total rewrite is in order? Mystache 23:13, 6 July 2006 (UTC)

Redirect

Why does "Position Papers" redirect to Model UN? thats like redirecting "thesis" to Yale's Philosophy Department.

• Then RfD it. Mystache 15:53, 4 August 2006 (UTC)
  • Or better yet, incorporate the idea of position papers into the article. --Spartacusprime 17:54, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

Links

I have taken the liberty of removing most of the links to other sites. I feel that they had nothing to do with MUN itself and had more to do with preparation sites for conferences. As an MUNer myself, I know how hard it is to find good research sites, but Wikipedia is not the appropriate place to include them. Also many of them were links to sites that had to do with the 'real' UN (like the ones dealing with treaties and such), and should be placed on that website rather than this one. I know many of you out there disagree and will probably crucify me on this issue, but please understand where I am coming from. If you have any questions or concerns, feel free to contact me on my talk page, or post here. Thank you, --Pahoran513 21:31, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

I have put back 3 links that deal with MUN in general, not conference-specific, country-specific, or "homework help" sites. I support the goal of keeping the list of EL's free of cruft, but that doesn't mean we can't have a useful, relevant few. Wl219 01:20, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

History

Has anyone ever published a decent history of MUNs of the kind that could validate some of these history claims? Bmorton3 17:57, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Cleaning Up

I've tidied up the article a bit, to make it more NPOV and verifiable. Unfortunately, the only source that I could find was in German: [2]. If anyone else can find sources in English then do update the page.

MUN doesn't just simulate the UN

I've reverted the first paragraph, as saying that MUN is a simulation of the UN is not accurate - as the article points out, MUN also simulates, for example, the European and African Unions at some conferences. If someone can come up with a wording to reflect this in the first paragraph, that would be great, but nothing straightforward comes to mind. Anthony.moore 16:00, 25 August 2006 (UTC)Anthony.moore

I firmly agree with your point. I have represented the European Union a total of two times now all within my high school's MUN team, which aims at not only regional conferences but outside of the state as well, so no one can tell me that it's "just my school" either.

MUN also simulates some special committees as well... Why isn't European Union in this wiki page at all? or the African Union, as user Anthony.moore has pointed out? neilthecellist 20:36 2 November 2006

IP Address 72.152.238.188

This person needs to be blocked. Who do I go to for that? Spartacusprime 02:26, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

What is this person's user name? Cheetoian 08:15, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

• He or she has no name, just an IP address from where they continually vandalise. Spartacusprime 20:52, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

See WP:AIV if he does it again. --M1ss1ontomars2k4 ^{(T | C | @)} 03:55, 31 October 2006 (UTC)

Citations

This article is not very fully cited - I've put together a website with quite a lot of information about MUN from a variety of sources - you can find it at http://uk.geocities.com/uclmodelun/. In accordance with the NPOV policy, I'm posting the link here rather than changing the article myself. Anthony.moore 11:19, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

I think you mean WP:OR. --M1ss1ontomars2k4 ^{(T | C | @)} 03:57, 31 October 2006 (UTC)

There needs to be citations of the high schools that are listed as being rather successful. At this point, it just seems like shameless advertising. Spartacusprime 14:47, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

Jokes and Pick Up Lines

I hope nobody minds, but I added this section. It is a very important part of any MUN conference.

No doubt funny, and no doubt prevalent, but I question the encylcopedic value. However, I'm going to voice my opinion and let someone else who can cite wikipolicy one way or another make a decision. --Columba livia 03:33, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

Not relevant to the subject. I'm going to archive the list on my user page, but I don't think it has any real place here. Spartacusprime 19:15, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

Take it to Uncyclopedia or Munfo (the above mentioned MUN wiki). Wl219 00:53, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

External links

Please do not add external links that are not general in nature. If we begin to list links to pages promoting each and every individual simulation under the sun again, it'll be prone to the same issues that prompted the deletion of such a list last month: Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Regional organizers and events of Model United Nations. Rather, link only to those simulations that are notable enough to warrant inclusion in the wiki, and then only through internal links. MrZaius^talk 19:04, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

From the talk page for the anonymous user that made the last two reverted edits, just in case their IP changes before they hit the site the again:

Your edits to Model United Nations were reverted again because they added little to nothing to the general description of Model United Nations programs. Also, you claimed that the two sims were variously "preeminent ...... arguably in the entire world" and "established as the top conference on the college circuit." Neither of these descriptions are valid without sources and more specific language. See WP:Weasel. What you might want to do is create an account and start an article at University of Chicago Model United Nations programs and cover them there, being careful to make a case for their notability on a national/international level and to cite sources for any statements like the ones quoted here. MrZaius^talk 21:20, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

Strong American bias

This article does not reflect accurately the variety of MUN cultures across the globe. It explains the differences between the awards policies in the US West Coast and in the US East Coast, it mentions the language policy of North American (US, Canadian and Mexican) conferences and it even states that the majority of MUNs still take place in the United States. Until the 1980s or 1990s this would not be questionable. Indeed, America had a quasi-monopoly on MUN during the Cold War.

However, MUN culture has gone truly global. Reportedly there are at least 30 to 40 conferences in Brazil, with around 5,000 to 6,000 delegates taking part on a yearly basis. In Russia, probably more than four thousand students gather every year in the largest MUN conferences alone, from the Baltic to the Pacific. Figures are even higher in Mexico, while Argentina, Japan, the Netherlands, Venezuela and Pakistan, to mention just a few, are also extremely important and fast-growing MUN centers.

A few years ago, UNA-USA estimated that 200,000 students worldwide participated in Models United Nations every year. This is an old figure, from 1999, I believe, and any update would probably be closer to 350,000. We actually used to say 400,000 in the UNA-USA office in Sao Paulo, where I used to work. I doubt that more than 50% of those are from the United States. MUN is a truly cosmopolitan thing now, and this should somehow be reflected in this article, which otherwise is very good. 81.80.51.103 17:36, 14 May 2007 (UTC)

The explanations are merely there as examples of the diferences of award policies. I do agree with you that MUN is a global institution, but American bias is not how i'd describe this. I'd also agree that more international information can and should be added, but historically, it is an US institution, and most of the data comes from the US.

Personally, I wouldn't mind seeing the bulk of the text concerning award policies rewritten in sourced & more general language, stripping it of its examples. They really don't add much that a well written definition wouldn't cover. Concerning the updated stats and what not, it'd be great to be able to add them, but any such claims should be sourced per WP:CITE. Might also be nice to cover links between MUN organizations. The senior staff at the [AMUN] were instrumental in putting together one a MUN drawing in many students from former Soviet states. Anything else that would help add an international perspective to the article would certainly be welcome. MrZaius^talk 20:42, 15 May 2007 (UTC)

Individual University Model UNs

What is the current preferred status of these? A number of them have suddenly been proposed for deletion, and some of them even blanked. Some of the redirects were also proposed for deletion or blanked. What I would suggest is that the articles for the national scope ones be kept, and the articles for the individual university ones redirected to the main article.

As I understand it there is never a reason to blank a page, except in cases of major vandalism, or libel, or other BLP violation, or major copyright violation. Blanking otherwise seems to be generally considered as vandalism

I was about to revert many of these changes until I realised that they were being done systematically, and therefore it would make sense to discuss them first. DGG 20:32, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

If you see someone blanking a page, treat it as vandalism and revert without thinking twice. That should never be done. For the others, the main thing we need to do is just make sure that all the ones that meet WP:NOTE survive. That is the guiding principle by which the wiki operates. DGG: Got links to the pages you've been looking at? MrZaius^talk 20:37, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

Also, the only reason to delete a redirect pointing here would be if that redirect was blocking a move. The others are all just pages that were either merged in here or redirected to discourage recreation after deletion. If you see a redirect flagged for deletion or blanked, please revert immediately and notify the editor at fault that he is just that. MrZaius^talk 20:40, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

Final note - Just want to make it clear to whoever ends up reading this that I am fully aware that a fair number of articles about regional simulations do not meet WP:NOTE, such as the Yale SecCon and Belgian pages. There are others that plainly warrant retention, however. MrZaius^talk 20:43, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

I'm the mysterious prod/blank-er. It's generally been policy on the AfD board that any model un conference is not notable (even ones ive wanted to keep[3]) and so I consider it merely housekeeping. As to blanking the redirects, they all simply redirected here. I considered RfDing them but applied WP:SNOW in my head and took a more Machiavellian approach. While blanking a series of NN redirects clearly isnt vandalism, I'll certainly RfD them in the future if you feel so strongly about it.

I'd also support the development of some sort of notabiliy guidelines as to allow for at least some limited coverage of conference. As it stands these conferences have no place, in terms of notability, on wikipedia. Mystache 03:41, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

Proposed notability guideline for individual MUN conferences

In light of the above discussion, I'm starting a new topic here proposing a notability guideline so that we can keep a few of the individual MUN conference articles on Wikipedia. Comments welcome of course.

• Articles about conferences run by non-profit organizations independent of a school or university should be judged by the existing Wikipedia:Notability (organizations and companies) guideline, and the underlying notability should be based on the conference sponsoring organization. Editors should use reasonable judgment to determine whether the conference is notable as the organization's main focus, one of its major foci, or a relatively small program compared to its other activities.
• Articles about conferences run by high schools are not notable unless all of the following are met:
  • The conference has been in continuous existence for more than four years. (Rationale: to avoid short-lived conferences that cease to exist once a student founder graduates or supervising teacher leaves.)
  • The conference is attended by a geographically diverse set of schools. There is no magic formula for diversity, but be reasonable. One or two out-of-area schools will not be sufficient. (Rationale: I am normally wary of this due to WP:LOCAL and systemic bias concerns, but geographic diversity is one of the factors indicating that a conference is worth going to (and thus worth writing about).)
  • The conference can satisfy in spirit the WP:ATT proposed standard, especially WP:ATT's underlying policies of WP:V, WP:OR, and WP:RS. (Rationale: we expect nothing different from any other article.)
• Articles about conferences run by a university are not notable unless all of the following are met:
  • The conference has been in continuous existence for more than four years. (Rationale: to avoid short-lived conferences that cease to exist once a student founder graduates or supervising teacher leaves.)
  • The conference is attended by a geographically diverse set of schools, or if it is for high school students then a large number of high schools. (Rationale: I am relaxing the standard for universities since on Wikipedia there seems to be a consensus that articles about universities are generally more notable per se than articles about high schools. I have added numbers because even if a university-run conference lacks geographical diversity, it may still be notable if a significant number of high schools in its area attend.)
    • To satisfy geographical diversity, there is no magic formula but be reasonable. One or two out-of-area schools will not be sufficient.
    • To satisfy numbers, there should be consistently 12 or more high schools attending.
  • The conference can satisfy in spirit the WP:ATT proposed standard, especially WP:ATT's underlying policies of WP:V, WP:OR, and WP:RS. (Rationale: we expect nothing different from any other article.)

Wl219 04:22, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

All of that sounds good. I think a delegate threshold may also be necessary to ensure were getting conferences of proper magnitude. 500 sounds like a good number to me.Mystache 05:07, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

There's a problem with that number. What if a, MUN is in existance for - say - five years. It once achieved to attract 500 delegates to the conference.. Will it be notable then or does it need to get 500 delegates every year?—♦♦ SʘʘTHING^(Я) 06:06, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

Also a delegate number could possibly exclude notable conferences that only operate small crisis committees (like VICS or CMUNCE). They average only about 10-15 delegates per committee and average about 10 committees. Wl219 09:13, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

I'd say 10 years rather than 4. Doesn't take much to hold four conferences.

That said, I don't really see why we need more than WP:NOTE & WP:ATT. The bulk of the conferences flagged for deletion don't meet the general notability guidelines and, more importantly, didn't attempt to defend a case for note in the article proper. Exceptions include NMUN, held at the UN HQ, claims to be world's largest, etc. Others with a decent case for note include the large and old (40+ years) Harvard conferences and an article I'm drafting about the American Model United Nations, similar in size and given major media coverage at the end of last year over a student's disappearance. All of them can be defended under the conventional WP:NOTE & WP:ATT guideline, given a touch of work, without having to author anything specific to the MUN conferences cat. MrZaius^talk 13:13, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

A special consensus/guideline on MUN conferences, while limited in application, would be more useful than the general WP:NOTE. I think if we only rely on WP:NOTE for AfD, we'll keep getting kids who come here and say "no, this conf is notable because of such and such," backed with a source or not. A specific consensus with brightline criteria would nip all that in the bud. There are now a number of offshoots of WP:NOTE such as WP:PORNBIO, WP:ORG, etc., dealing exactly with situations where the general WP:NOTE does not offer enough guidance. Wl219 14:06, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

It's failed in other cases: Wikipedia:Schools. My bigger point is: who's going to actively monitor those pages and promote the guideline, and how? Only rarely are new pages for conferences accurately categorized at the start. On a side note, if an RfC is thrown up, be sure to announce it on the UN WikiProject's talk page, since they're a little more likely to be interested than most.

That said, if the above does get turned into an RfC, leading to specific guidelines, 4 years seems a little on the short side, and a drop in the bucket compared to some 30-70 year old pre-UN sims that originated during the League of Nations. Ten would be a safer bet. MrZaius^talk 19:54, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

I think there should be another consideration as well. What if a conference is the main MUN event for a certain country, and is international in scope, but is a relatively new and comparatively small conference BY DESIGN? I think such guidelines should be reasonable. Ten years is too long. If a conference is five years old and clearly both growing and stable, that seems like it should be kept. ludahai 魯大海 03:39, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

I think we are underestimating how many conferences meet the criteria proposed above. In Orange County, a number of high schools (Mission Viejo, Tustin, Edison, etc.) have been running conferences for 20+ years with 1500+ delegates attending annually. The only condition that it possibly fails is "geographically diverse," but even the OC schools get students from all over the state, and even a few from out of state and abroad. I imagine this is the case for many other conferences across the United States. BestDelegateDotCom

Poorly Written Article

I am an MUN instructor and the preparation as given in this article is nothing like how we prepare students to participate in an MUN conference. I do realize that there are differences between how University conferences are conducted compared with their high school and middle school (which I coordinate and instruct) counterparts. When time permits, I will try to improve this article to reflect the true nature of preparation and participation in middle school and high school level conferences. ludahai 魯大海 03:32, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

First MUN Conference

The article claims that founded in 1951, Harvard's MUN is the oldest. However, Harvard's MUN is currently in its 55th session ([4]; Harvard Model United Nations) whereas the Berkeley MUN is in its 56th session ([5]). It is my understanding that Berkeley's is older by several months. 192.58.221.215 23:02, 22 October 2007 (UTC)

Issues

Should we provide examples of issues? I happen to have one, here.

PROTECTION OF DIPLOMATIC AND CONSULAR MISSIONS IN FOREIGN STATES

National safety is a constantly invoked issue when dealing between any countries and international organizations. Both embassies and consulates are granted, under international law, an extraterritorial status within the nation that they're stationed within. Therefore, they are exempt from the local laws of their host countries and treated as a territorial part of their home country. Under these premises, the host country is unable to enter the grounds of the embassy without permissions, and the sovereignty of the home country extends over the area of the embassy. However, there have been numerous incidents where either diplomatic or consular missions have come under attack by citizens or militants of the host country. This modern idea of diplomatic immunity was instated by the Vienna Convention of Diplomatic Relations in 1961, adopted that April by the United Nations and bestowed this diplomatic immunity upon all embassies or formally acknowledged states. Diplomats are ensured protection against prosecution by the host country, though the host nation reserves the right to expel diplomats from their country.

Despite this obligation to protect foreign embassies, major breaches have occurred. Most recent accounts of such violence on embassies are the February 2008 attacks on the embassies of the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany, and Turkey (which have been formally condemned by the UN Security Council) after their declarations of support for Kosovo's independence. Other notable breaches include the Iranian hostage crisis in 1979, a Peruvian party storming a Japanese embassy in Lima and taking several hostages in their embassy in 1996, and attacks on the embassies of Norway, Denmark, and Chile in Iran, Lebanon, and Syria in 2006.

Since the passing of General Assembly resolution 35/168, states have been making biannual reports to the Secretary General on the security and safety of diplomatic and consular missions and the steps taken to bring offenders to justice. However, these reports have been criticized for being too limited in terms of information. Such reports are often incomplete, and the General Assembly has been working to improve these reports.

Questions to Consider:

How effective are the biannual reports made by the Secretary General? Is there anything that could be done to bolster their effectiveness and provide more incentive for individual nations to report? What can be done to aid those countries that lack funds to protect foreign embassies within their own borders? In these situations, where does the obligation to protect diplomatic personnel fall: to the host country or the country of origin? What can be done to prevent further attacks on diplomatic and consular missions? What measures are appropriate after an attack on an embassy? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.127.172.154 (talk) 10:48, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

• No, I dont think it would be prudent to add such a section. We can leave background guides to conference-goers. Mystache (talk) 14:26, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

Re. MUN conferences in NZ only in Maori

I think this little factoid is probably not true. Play-versions of joke organisations or no, they just wouldn't be that stupid. John Nevard (talk) 13:31, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

Merger Proposal

Looking at the three articles on individual conferences (Geneva International Model United Nations, Harvard United Nations simulations, and National Model United Nations, from Category:Model United Nations conferences), I don't see any reason not to merge the articles for the individual conferences into a short list of summaries within this main article (as part of eventually improving this article itself): first, the conferences' articles all have to give the same explanation for context about what happens at a conference in general, and, second, not counting those shared explanations, each article only really includes about two sentences of appropriate information (Geneva: official status, Harvard: oldest, largest in US, NMUN: largest again), along with a lot of self-promotion.
(So, essentially, reasons: "Text" and "Context"). Wikimancer (talk) 23:48, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

I do agree the articles all give little information about those conferences. However, I believe there is too much information to cramp it all together in the main article, especially considering they might grow in the future. Since those conferences are visited by hundreds of students every year, some might want to add some information and they will either start the single articles again or continue stuffing the summaries on the main article.
Although the articles as they are now are not very useful, I believe merging them will make it harder to further develop them and finally make them useful. I do however regard as helpful a short list with very (!) short summaries in the main article. Deivo (talk) 20:06, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

I would contend that those articles could actually just be condensed into a list or table with location, date founded, etc. and a "Notes" sentence on notable history/status ("official NGO," "oldest," and "largest"); I would also specifically disagree that there should be much that could be allowable information added to be expected, considering what I think should be a goal of discouraging the addition of ephemeral personal takes and information on conferences.


Incidentally, I'm also going to bring up the argument for the record that, in the context of the "Conferences" or "Notable Conferences" section here that these articles would ideally become, the measure for inclusion of individual conferences should categorically be notability (where the opposing argument could be that listing conferences by sponsoring colleges and organizations could be helpful in illustrating prevalence and community, e.g.) per WP:NOT#LINK, WP:SPAMMER, and WP:DIR. Wikimancer (talk) 04:24, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

You're right that a lot of "information" by participating students might be just personal notes etc. which violate NOR. What I wanted to refer to is committed students actually looking for information from independant sources about the different conferences. Deivo (talk) 22:55, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

Considering the bareness of those last three currently existing conference articles, though, is there really any encyclopedic information that exists, or could exist, to be added though? Specifically, I would make the point that, considering the nature of the activity, there isn't much significant information to be reported about specific conferences by independent sources beyond, again the few notable characterizations of those three-ish well established conferences. Wikimancer (talk) 03:29, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

So long as the content can be saved in the merge without pushing this article to the point where a split would be warranted, I don't see a problem. Case for WP:NOTE is fairly difficult to make for any of these conferences, although less so for the ones mentioned here. Many of the others, however, may warrant attention first - did someone already get rid of the articles about the less prominent East Indies MUNs? MrZaius^talk 21:27, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

In reverse order: I did my best to go through the articles that link to this article, as well as to "MUN" (the articles left to delete mostly with the latter) and (nominated to get and) got all the little conferences and groups I could find deleted. To your first point, I'll try and put up a table with the basic information to be merged for approval to illustrate potential conciseness. Wikimancer (talk) 03:29, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

I'm actually going to have to oppose the merge proposal. While I can appreciat trying to consolidate coverage of MUN on wikipedia, I think this specific proposal opens up a pandora's box of spammers. I can't tell you how many times in the past year I've had to remove conference links and bogus copy and I'm sure many of you have had to do the same. I think integrating conferences in only welcomes more of that. Additionally Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Regional organizers and events of Model United Nations established that conferences should be notable each on their own merits and I think having each have its own article is the simplest way to ensure that. Mystache (talk) 23:44, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

I'd say that point itself would be a reason for merging: it's much easier to watch for and revert non-notable conferences on this one page than to keep scanning "What links here" for the new articles that seem to have been able to slip by pretty easily (judging by the number (three) of those kinds of articles I was still able to find yesterday). I think I could also extend the scope of my pre-emptive argument from April 11 a few paragraphs up to address your point. Wikimancer (talk) 03:29, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Having a list on the main article doesn't prevent people from creating new articles though. But well, I guess you could just delete anything that's not on the main article. This would be, however, not much easier than it is now; furthermore, valuable information might be lost and it might exasperate people who want to contribute to WP. Deivo (talk) 09:19, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

I've added a trial section, so to speak, for "Notable conferences" to model what the merged content would look like (actually, this version would pretty much be it; I already included all the details to be added from the articles in question). I tried to sum up a warning for the concerns about inclusion in this issue in a comment at the beginning of the section (based on the warning at the beginning of the External Links section). Wikimancer (talk) 06:02, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

As part of a consolidation effort for organizations that are part of the Harvard International Relations Council, I have merged the information presented in Harvard United Nations simulations into the new, umbrella article. That being the case, I have removed the merge proposal for the Harvard page here. Optimusnauta (talk) 05:33, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

Conference Notability (again)

Considering we now have a conferences section, like it or not, were going to have to establish guidelines for inclusion. Any ideas? Mystache (talk) 22:17, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

So, I just removed the first inappropriate addition to come up, and I tried to put up a more definitive "NOTE TO EDITORS" at the top and bottom of the section. As for the process of assessment, I think it could just be made an issue of WP:SPAM: if an item (and, correspondingly, a link) is added, it must be accompanied with information that contributes beyond simply elaborating on that one specific conference (I'd say a primary qualification would be whether the conference in question would be worthy of inclusion in either one of the articles it links to or in the "History" section of this article). On the same subject and as a measure of that thought, I think it could also be a good idea just to warn editors who add inappropriate conferences with the good-faith spam warning tag. Wikimancer (talk) 21:04, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

How the section on notable conferences does not include THIMUN is beyond me. This is a horrible article. 218.170.10.193 (talk) 11:09, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

So edit it. Mystache (talk) 17:42, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

I would suggest the following criteria for notability. As long as a conference meets one of these conditions, it is considered notable.

1. Participant size greater than 2000; I only know of a few conferences who get to this level
2. History greater than 50 years, i.e. almost as old as the UN itself
3. Takes place at the UN Headquarters; this essentially means UNA-USA MUN, NMUN, NHSMUN
4. Has NGO status, which might just mean GIMUN, though I'm not sure

By this metric, THIMUN and NHSMUN need to be included. Moreover, I believe HNMUN also started as a League of Nations simulation, so its "Founding" might date earlier than 1955. This might also have been the case with Berkeley as well.

BestDelegateDotCom (talk) April 19 2008 3 PM EST

Those sound fair, and should keep the list from getting prohibitively long. I'm not sure GIMUN's NGO status makes it notable as a conference, though it did make it notable as a wikipedia article, and for now thats satisfactory for me. Mystache (talk) 14:38, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

We should think about the reform of the criterias, whilst the idea of MUN is spreading arround the world. It is not true that only the MUN's in the USA are so noticable. I think this table lacks the inclusion of BERMUN and WAWMUN, which are the two most noticable conferences in Europe after THIMUN. They are hosting arround 1,5 k of delegates annually, which gives them the third or fourth place at the highschool level globaly, by the criterium of number of the delegates.

wojtigup (talk) MAY 8 2008 12.00 GMT —Preceding unsigned comment added by 62.121.68.23 (talk) 10:57, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

I'll be one of the first to say the guidelines aren't perfect. But I think we can also agree that about 1500 delegates is not 1500 delegates and 1500 is certainly not 2000 -- both are several magnitudes away from each other. I'm also not sure what kind of position that puts these conferences ordinally on a global scale (even if just of hs conferences), but I do think it would be significantly lower than third and fourth (cf unausamun, nhsmun, beimun, bmun, ymcamun, and naimun, just off the top of my head)

Nonetheless, the list should be representative of a global perspective as per wikipedia policy. And at the same time, it also can't be endless, lest we risk becoming a linkfarm and having to delete all of it and start over. Understanding these parameters, I'm open to any suggestions to modify the thresholds. Mystache (talk) 20:39, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

Also, suggesting changes to the guideline is not changing the guideline. Please uphold current standards until there is consensus amongst the editors. =)

NGO Status

I think perhaps we should refine the guideline on "NGO Status" as a criterion for inclusion, specifying that in order to meet notability, orgs should have 'special consultative status' as designated by a UN body. This is because, I think we can agree, holding NGO status with a non-UN organization is less relevant to an article on model united nations. Similarly, holding roster status, IMO, doesn't break a threshold of notability, as it amounts predominantly to being on a mailing list and thus SCS represents a more significant metric. Mystache (talk) 11:59, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

PASMUN

I believe PASMUN should also be added to the list of notable conferences. It is essentially the largest and most important simulation for high school students in the whole of latin america. Although it might not exactly comply with the established standards for notability, it is still important to note it, as most of the conferences included are either in Europe or America. The standard designed are somehow favorable to rich nations. For example, in mexico, PASMUN is the oldest conference (with 25 years) but that is only so because MUN did not begin in Latin America until that time. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Banaya (talk • contribs) 23:13, 21 August 2008 (UTC)