MUN Overview
General Assembly
General Assembly committees focus on solving real world issues ranging from human rights, health challenges, environmental threats, and much more. Delegates work on giving speeches and writing solutions on the chosen topic. Each delegate represents a given country and must abide by their policies while working with other countries in committee. The goal of every GA is to address problems and ideas to decrease barriers regarding the situation and to pass resolutions to solve the global issue.
Parliamentary
Procedures
Parliamentary procedure is a structure of rules for debate to flow more efficiently. Most procedures follow the same set of rules, but it can change every conference. The chair or dais from your committee will usually let you know the run down of committee, but do not hesitate to ask about the procedures.
Crisis
Crisis committees are more fast paced than other committees as they require delegates to quickly come up with solutions to solve the crisis present. Crisis committees are not real world issues, but rather fictional conflicts. Types of crisis committees vary from issues within movies, companies, history, governments, shows, etc. Delegates represent different characters relating to the crisis. Although delegates must come up with solutions to the issues, they are also expected to come up with their own plan to steer the crisis in a different direction.
Research
Researching is key to doing well in committee and every delegate must research in order to succeed. Researching for committee is the basis to understanding your topic and developing solutions. Researching allows you to show your extensive knowledge about various topics and helps to formulate well-developed ideas, solutions, and speeches. Being able to have a further understanding of the issue at hand and addressing it with substance will make you stand out from the rest.
Specialized
Position Papers
Specialized or hybrid committees include both elements from general assembly and crisis committees. There are certain procedural matters that differ from a regular GA and crisis; procedures depend on what your staff wants and it may be different every conference. Specialized committees may include writing a resolution paper, crisis notes, directives, or only a few of those elements. The staff will let always let you know what they want done. "In essence, specialized committees may be more liberal in nature than general assemblies, and more conservative than crisis committees. We consider them to be in the middle of the Model UN spectrum." (GatorMUN Staff)
Position papers are short papers which entail the background of the topic and solutions to the issue. These papers are meant to help for researching and preparing for committee. Not every committee requires writing a position paper, but it can influence awards. Papers should be emailed to your chair and must be submitted before the deadline given.
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Check the GA and Crisis procedures/tips to succeed documents for further guidance.