Esteemed Delegates,

It is my honor to welcome you to ILMUNC 2010 and the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC). My name is Catherine Gao, and I will be serving as your Chair for the duration of the conference. Your Vice-Chair will be Gandharv Bedi, and your Dais staff members will be Catherine Galloway and Maria Lamadrid, all dedicated members of the Penn International Affairs Association. Needless to say, we are very excited to be preparing for this committee and hope you are as well.

For a little background, I am a junior in Wharton concentrating in Finance and Marketing with a minor in East Asian Studies. I have been involved in Model UN since my sophomore year of high school and am very passionate about international affairs and development. Here at Penn, I’ve served as the Director-General for our college Model UN conference, UPMUNC (University of Pennsylvania Model United Nations Conference). In addition to MUN, I am involved in a rural education nonprofit called Givology (www.givology.org).

This year, we have two interesting topics to debate: 1) Business and Human Rights and 2) Child Soldiers. These two topics are very different but equally important, and I look forward to the lively debate during conference.

The purpose of Model UN is for students like you to understand the problems facing the world today and what countries can do to work toward solutions resolving these issues. I look forward to collaboration among delegates and innovative resolutions. I encourage all delegates to conduct thorough research regarding the proposed topics and come prepared to share your ideas and suggestions with the rest of your committee.

See you in January!

Sincerely,

Catherine Gao

Chair, United Nations Human Rights Council

Ivy League Model United Nations Conference XXVI