Brief History of WAP

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The Florida State University World Affairs Program was founded in the mid-eighties in conjunction with the United Nations Association of the United States of America (UNA-USA) and the College of Social Science's International Affairs Department. The seed money for the program came from both sources and with additional aide provided by the Provost. Founded as a Model United Nations (MUN) club it flourished with the aide of all three funding sources until the early nineties.

Around 1991 we broke off our relationship with UNA-USA and began to diversify our activities to more fully serve the students of FSU. Starting in 1989 we received consideration from Senate along with the other 6 SAP's from the previous "committee". At this time we were using A&S money along with E&G money from the Provost to fund our activities, with occasional emergency support from the Dean of the College of Social Science.

When the diversification of activities began, our membership blossomed to include many different majors and colleges. Due to our mission and activity's relation to the International Affairs Program we were permitted to keep office space in Bellamy; however, funding from the Dean was cut to a minimum. In 1997 a clerical mistake in the College of Social Science led to the zero funding of WAP from Senate. The following year the Senate decided to move away from funding Academic Programs with A&S dollars. Working with the Senate President Johnson, Chief of Staff Grindler, Vice-President Harris, and President Fedele a plan for SAP's was developed using E&G money from the differential tuition money. We now find ourselves entirely dependent on the SAP committee for funding to operate, as it should have been years ago. Now for a look into what we do.

Model UN is, as you may know, the practice of simulating the United Nations by having a student represent a nation or individual in a particular committee. The student is expected to research both their country/individual and the issues that the committee deals with thoroughly. Other skills necessary to set oneself apart for recognition in the competition are negotiation, political savvy, being well versed in current issues, public speaking, leadership, and drive to succeed at the given task. MUN is the base from which all of our activities have sprung. The true turn for the program was the introduction of Crisis Committees.

The 1991 move from UNA-USA was partially due to our desire to move into the Crisis Simulation market at the premier Security Conference in the country the National Collegiate Security Conference (NCSC) hosted by Georgetown University in Washington, D.C. We had already made a name for FSU on the MUN circuit by taking numerous second and third place finishes at the University of Pennsylvania and Harvard National Model UN. Also, at the largest regional conference in the country, Southern Regional Model UN we had won overall several times.

Our reputation as a premier university for Crisis simulation would be built starting in 1998. The 1998 season we took 2nd overall at NCSC, at the University of Chicago Model UN w/ Crisis, and at the Virginia International Committee Simulation. The three 2nd places marked a turning point from occasional top team to true concern for the Ivy League that generally has dominated the country for years. In 1999 we backed up our performance with several more 2nd place finishes before taking the National Championship at NCSC in October of 2000. The Championship was backed up by 2nd place performances in our final two conferences of the year. Our average finish for the year tied us with Yale for first in the nation.

While our competitive team was at its height so too was our involvement on campus. We restarted our programming division to include this year two training conferences for young delegates, co-hosted with the University of Florida. We also held public forums on issues with professors on the panel, held a public speaking workshop with 3 public speaking experts talking to the group, and got involved with student self-governance.