BratMUN stands for Bratislava Model United Nations. It is an accurate simulation of a congress of the United Nations, in which high-school students take on the roles of both the delegates and the organizing team. BratMUN was founded by IBD programme students from the Gymnasium of Jur Hronec in November 2000, 11 years after the Velvet Revolution. See this report from BratMUN 2018.
Since its very beginnings, BratMUN has been organized 24 times, the venue changing from Gymnasium of Jur Hronec, to the National Council of the Slovak Republic and the Faculty of Law of the Pan-European University. During its history, high-school students from Sweden, Poland, Italy, USA, Slovenia, Turkey, Czech Republic, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Hungary, Norway, Austria and many other countries have attended. Today, BratMUN is a three day long conference for almost 200 delegates, who debate current and controversial topics of global importance in eight to nine UN committees and councils, World Health Organization, UN Security Council or UN Economic and Financial Affairs Council being the staple parts of BratMUN. In the second half of the conference, all delegates debate the main topic of the conference in the UN General Assembly. Negotiations in each committee or council end up with producing an official resolution voted on by all delegates present.
BratMUN fosters critical thinking, develops argumentative capabilities, spreads the awareness of global issues and supports lively, multilateral discussions. Furthermore, it motivates the delegates to learn more about other countries, because they are never assigned their home countries. Before the conference, the chairperson of each committee creates an introduction to the topic and every delegation submits a clear stance of its country towards the issue. At the end of BratMUN, best delegates from each committee and the best delegation of the General Assembly are awarded.
All crucial posts like the President of the General Assembly, Chairpersons, Secretary General and Head of Delegation Services are held by students of 4. IB – the graduating students. Their successors, the students of 3. IB get the know-how of organizing the conference by helping the main members of staff, for example by serving as vice-chairpersons or delegation guides. Organizing BratMUN is challenging and requires a broad range of skills, from managing 40 staff members and 220 guests, communicating with sponsors and partners, choosing attractive topics, managing the negotiation process, to developing and maintenance of the conference’s website and its registration system.