JFK Model UN Hosts First Home Conference

Photo by Tristan Luu

On April 11th, JFK Model UN Club hosted its first conference at its home school, John F. Kennedy High School. This event, Titan Model United Nations Conference (Titan MUNC) requires tremendous planning and was led by two seniors: Khanh Do (12), who serves as Secretary-General, and Antara Eruvuri (12), who serves as Director-General. The weekend was filled with productive debate across the Kennedy campus, with 90 participating delegates from across Sacramento, San Francisco, Santa Rosa, and within Fremont Unified district. The round room, Mr. Jung’s, Mr. Lydon’s, Ms. Dollard’s were all rooms that were used.

“Some of the things we had to keep in mind were: securing facility usage, publicizing the conference, building a website, selecting debate topics, retrieving good chairs who dictate debate, solidifying finances, and getting supplies set up for the conference,” revealed Do.

This is not the first time JFK Model UN has played a part in hosting a conference however, as they hosted a conference last year in conjunction with American High School, called Coast MUNC. The leadership team of the conference, or the secretariat, also paid close attention to all of the high school and college conferences to extract the best elements and bring it to Titan MUNC. The board even held a meeting talking with the Berkeley MUN secretariat team to get an idea of what hosting a conference is like.

Eruvuri stated, “The experience working at Coast MUNC really helped because we were setting it up alongside the seniors last year, so we had a lot of hands-on experience. I also talk with a lot of my MUN friends about the pros and cons of different conferences, the award systems, and what makes conferences memorable.”

The ideation of the conference started the previous school year, where the entire board is bent on hosting the conference. Working out the logistics of the conference took up the whole year, and as the club gained shadow officers, these new leaders lent a helping hand.

“We spent months planning it, talking to friends, trying to get schools to attend, and seeing if we could reach full capacity,” said Eruvuri.

Do recalls doing college applications worrying about the conference, and then working on the conference in the midst of receiving college results along with sport and ROP externship. “On some hard days, what got me through was knowing this conference was going to happen, and I got to show off mine and my team’s hard work.”

The secretariat maintained a consistent design style throughout the conference, with repeating the font style, patterns, and colors. Delegates observed Ancient Greek-styled borders and fonts with purple, gold, maroon, and white in their background guides and Instagram page. Murals and streamers would be hung up as decorations following the similar branding, differentiating the conference from others who are more content-focused.

Do explained, “I want a duality in a conference. It needs to feel solid in the MUN aspect  and also feel festive as other events as well. I was inspired by Homecoming workdays and senior nights I have participated in the past and implemented it into this conference.

During the day of the conference, there were also fundraisers selling boba, pizzas, and polaroids. Eruvuri had a blast throughout the whole day.

“Some of my favorite memories were during lunch when we were all sitting together selling things, singing karaoke, and then watching crisis updates happen,” revealed Eruvuri.

William Jung, JFK MUN advisor, chipped in, “I heard a lot of positive feedback with the logistics… how chairs feedback was given promptly… and the decoration ideas, trying to be innovative. The seniors did really well.”

Do offer advice to next year’s organizers:”Always be extra, because that extra effort is noticed, and it will make you stand out against the other conferences. Try to compete with others around you, even if they have years of experience more than you.”