Innovation & Best Practice Chairs Team Report Tallinn 2012 The Chairs Team of the IS Tallinn 2012 would like to share with the wider EYP community what we believe to be innovations worthwhile to keep and best practices that might inspire other teams. This is just a selection of ideas, neither authoritative or representative – but inspiring we hope! 1) CAT in Brussels CAT took place in Brussels. These are the distinct advantages attached to this move: • Visit to the European Parliament – every chair actually knew and had seen what we are simulating at EYP. • Preparatory talks with experts – Brussels offers a multitude of practitioners and experts who are willing to talk. Our chairs met Commission officials, NGO representatives, business representatives and think tank members to prepare for their topics. Some even recorded their talks and shared them with the committee. • Teambuilding in the President’s living room – as Jonas is living in Brussels, CAT received a special personal touch, including pyjama parties. 2) Working Groups Following an idea of Andris Suvajevs, the chairs team established working groups at CAT that worked between CAT and the session. The establishment of the WG increased the ownership and involvement of the chairs team dramatically. Some of our most interesting activities in Tallinn were prepared by these WGs. Among the WG: a) delegate preparation, b) chairing methods, c) adding the sparkle, d) committee interactions, e) linking teambuilding to CW. 3) Topic input We established a website where delegates could make suggestions for the topics they would like to discuss. About a third to a half of the final topics for Tallinn were either inspired by these suggestions or refinements of the proposals. 4) Fact Sheets and Position Papers Under the leadership of Zahra Runderkamp and Andrea Stagni, and building on best practices in Italy and Germany, we asked the delegates to hand in a fact sheet and a position paper on their topic before the session. This move dramatically enhanced the academic preparation of the delegates, the quality of the debate and the soundness of the resolutions. Chairs used the fact sheets extensively to construct the introductory clauses in the committees. More info see annex. 5) Inter-Committee Consultations ‐ Interdependencies: During CAT, the chairs went through a module that helped them identify overlaps and interactions or interdependencies between their topics. The preparation kit included accordingly a visualisation of these interdependencies, as well as recommendations under each topic overview for further reading with related topics. One
‐
‐
consequence of this approach was that resolutions in Tallinn actually called for other committees to address certain sub-elements of the topic at hand. interaction method during CW: even though this could have been a more wide-spread practice in Tallinn, an interesting beginning was made: some chairs hung those phrases that were agreed upon on their doors. Bypassers could read the preliminary results and potentially even comment on it. (see idea graveyard on potential for further development) Inter-Committee Consultations: Built on the notion of a conciliation session, we took nearly 2 hours out of our GA preparation to invite delegates from other committees into the committees to discuss our results. The result of which was an increased use of friendly amendments and a substantial increase in the quality of the debates. More info, see annex.
6) Chairing Methods (a not representative collection) - Maps (used by Jan Bubienczyk) Maps can help delegates understand a topic (in this case a trade topic). He had delegates create maps on the basis of an empty political world map. This method can be varied in incredible ways: Have delegates draw trade flows, political (inter)dependencies or influences by way of value transfers are just three examples. - Issue tree (used by Mark Brakel) An issue tree is a form of mindmapping. The issue tree is a useful tool that ensures that all aspects of the topic are covered and has also been used at previous International Sessions. One way the issue tree can be used in Committee Work is by first brainstorming on (the core part of) the topic question, then categorising and finally discussing. After a quantity brainstorm has been finished, the delegates can be asked to think of two or three groups in which their solutions can be placed. The key thing here is that these groups are independent (meaning that there is absolutely no overlap) and complete. These groups are then broken down further. After some rounds of further specification, the delegates will arrive at the solutions, and these can then be discussed sub-sub-(sub-sub…) group by sub-sub (subsub..) group. A video is available to inform yourself in more detail on how an issue tree works and it can also be shown directly to the delegates during Committee Work. http://dl.dropbox.com/u/10418369/MPJ_website/issue_hyp_trees/flash/issue _tree/issue_tree.html - Fact Speed Dating (used by Gráinne Hawkes) Have the committee sit in a circle and share 3 facts with the person sitting opposite them. Then you shout ‘change’ and the outside circle moves around, sharing their 3 facts with the next person. It was a really fast and effective way of sharing factual information and worked really well as a tool with the ‘wall of facts’ as often delegates are afraid to question facts that they might not understand on the wall of facts and this gave them an opportunity to ask questions about the facts directly to each other. -
Finger Print Debrief (played by Gráinne Hawkes)
Buy finger paints in assorted colours and assign each colour a feeling or state. Get a poster. Red = something bad that they felt during the game. Green = something good in the game. Yellow = something they observed (good or bad) that the committee can improve on (a negative thing) /use to even greater effect (a positive thing). Blue (‘Blue skies ahead’ – what they’re feeling good about the committee going into committee work) Black (‘Dark Clouds ahead’ something they’re anxious about going into committee work/something they/the committee has to work on). Each delegate then puts their finger in one or more of the colours and explains to the group why he/she chose it/them. The result is a really cool finger print picture depicting how the committee is feeling and the diverse views/approaches they all have not only to subjects but the committee itself. I hung it up the committee room and used it to remind them of that fact during committee work. Smell Blindfold game (used in Tallinn, but seemingly introduced by Ezgi Ince used in Zagreb) You blindfold the committee and spray very different perfumes/smells on the delegates. The committee then have to ‘find/discover’ their other committee members with the same scent by sniffing each other. We used perfume (mens and womens), decongestant (like tea tree oil), lavender oil and mint breath spray but you can use anything! -
7) Excel-based Chairing Tools We used a new chairing tool in Tallinn that allows the rating of individual skills and of committees as a whole (courtesy of Joanna Kulpa and Jonas Dreger). The tool is excel-based and provides for a strong visualisation. It can be used to assess the progress of a committee at any given point during a session, but it also comes in useful to understand a chair’s skills and areas of future development. It also is helpful in writing recommendations after the session. See annex for the tool. 8) New Horizon Speech After a successful trial at the 6th IYF (Istanbul), we introduced the New Horizon Speeches (NHS) into GA. The NHS are speeches that can be delivered by any participant of the session from delegate to chair, journalist or organiser (or even teacher). The topic can be chosen freely and should not be related to the committee topics. We had a total of seven NHS between the debates, covering subjects from “the fallacy of democracy”, “the misperception of success”, “the importance of your voice” to more personal stories. We believe the New Horizon Speeches provided a breath of fresh air and for some of the most inspiring moments of Tallinn. More info, see annex. 9) GA Management - GA preparation: we trained the chairs and the chairs trained the delegates on public speaking, i.e. how to write and deliver a speech. We believe it led to a considerably higher level of speaking skills displayed. Example: one
 
-
-
-
-
delegate delivered his speech blindfolded. Another one started by actually admitting the flaws in the resolution. clustered debates: topics that were related content-wise, were discussed after one another. This approach allows delegates that are not as prepared for, e.g. foreign affairs topics, to start understanding the main issues in the debate on the first resolution and to then begin participating actively in the following debates on related topics. structured resolution debate: because one resolution was very long, we experimented with debating one resolution in 4 blocs (water, energy, transport, urban planning). Points during open debate were only accepted if they were related to the bloc that was the declared issue of debate at that point. It focused the debate much more, but took away some of the free flow of the discussions. unfriendly amendments: we used friendly amendments actively and encouraged their use. Next to this providing a less intrusive way of a structured resolution debate (see point before), it also invites another usage: we invited the committees to cooperate. If a committee believed one of its clauses was so controversial that it preferred a separate discussion on it, it could ask another committee to submit an unfriendly amendment on this clause on their behalf. This way, this phrase could be discussed and voted upon separately, and the resolution could potentially pass with or without the controversial clause. Jazz hands for applause: whenever we were short in time, we asked the delegates to indicate their approval of a point not by clapping but by shaking their hands in the air (so-called jazz hands). The atmosphere was very focused, the immediate feedback very appreciated.
10) Coordination methods The chairs, as well as the leadership structure of the session had their own programme. In these programmes, it was agreed before the session, when the chairs meetings would take place, as well as the board meetings and the meetings between board, HOs and editors. These programmes were flexibly adapted during the session, but allowed for a much better planning by everyone involved (and more sleep!). 11) Media Team - Coverage of CAT The editors used their participation of CAT in a very unique way: the produced a mockumentary about CAT based on the TV series ‘The Office’. You can see the episodes on youtube (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0OBgcfU_vdY&feature=plcp etc), in addition to short snippets of CAT that were released in the run-up to the session tos tart a hype. These episodes were used to introduce the chairs to the delegates, to show the delegates how seriously the chairs prepared and how much fun they had. Plus: they created a certain type of humour that was visible throughout the session and made the chairs very accessible. - Articles by non-journalists Articles were written not only by journalists, which allowed the delegates to share their views. Some of the best and most interesting articles were written by the delegates, who knew of this possibility already weeks before the session. Also, the chairs team contributed with an article for nearly every issue. The last article of this
kind was a criticism of ‘Imagine’ as a hymn, which initiated a facebook discussion that lasted for weeks after the session. - Specialisation & professionalization Tallinn had – in many ways - not one, but two media teams, each led by one of the editors. The print media team focused on producing a very high quality magazine and daily quick-and-dirty reporting. The video team produced the first professional EYP short movie, that was screened at the farewell party (length: 14:45, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6eaNgmXMVYE&feature=g-all-u), as well as several video snippets and a PED video. The excessive productivity was possible because the media team members did not have one committee assigned to constantly follow, but were rotating as necessary. The editors Michal Korzonek and Sandra Stojanovic put a lot of focus on giving the media team a proper training on professional journalism. 12) Idea Graveyard We had many more ideas that we would thought about implementing but did not end up using – either because of a lack of time to prepare or because we eventually did not see them as appropriate for Tallinn. Nevertheless, they are so interesting that we would like to nevertheless share them with you – who knows what they inspire?: ‐ voting during CW: for a while, we were playing with the idea of setting up an online voting system during CW. This system could have been used by the committees to get immediate feedback on some of the ideas they were discussing. ‐ Interaction run: If all the chairs had been able to hang out their clauses at around the same time, we could have had a break, where all delegates run through the building to comment in writing on as many clauses as possible in a pre-defined time. ‐ music and prezi for GA: We used music in some of the breaks of GA for mood management. However, we initially planned to use music just like in Oscar Ceremonies to cut speeches off after the 3 min mark. We also thought about using prezi as a presentation tool. ‐ live reporting from resolution typing: we played with the idea to have a live reporter at resolution typing, who could have broadcasted live to the EYP Café about the progress of resolution typing. ‐ Revealing chair secrets: using the magazine to actually reveal chair secrets, written by the chairs. This idea was based on the premise that delegates are already or are future chairs who can be taken serious as such. ‐ Ranking and rating committees: we thought about publishing the committee ratings during the session to give the delegates an opportunity to benchmark their committee performance against the performance of others. ‐ ImprovEverywhere: we initially thought of asking each committee to come up with one piece of improvisation during the session that would be inclusive enough for all people to join in. For questions: you know the chairs! If in doubt, contact Jonas (jonas.dreger@web.de)