National Collegiate Security Conference (NCSC), a yearly Model United Nations conference, is staffed by members of the Georgetown International Relations Club and is sponsored by the Georgetown International Relations Association, Inc. The 39th annual conference is this weekend from Thursday, Oct. 27 through Sunday, Oct. 30. The executives of this year’s conference, MichaelLopesciolo (SFS ’13) and Christie Shely (SFS ’13), a former Hoya staff writer and Deputy Photo Editor, have been planning the four-day conference for almost a year. They, along with a staff of about 120 students, will welcome almost 600 delegates from all over the country to Washington this weekend.

What exactly do you two do during and before the conference?

Lopesciolo : NCSC is sort of a Model United Nations conference, but we don’t do a lot of traditional United Nations simulations, which are generally very large and cover a couple of topics … and the delegates — a hundred or two hundred of them — debate for a couple of days … and vote on different policies. We do a lot of much smaller, much faster-paced committees that simulate things like a national cabinet or very small summit or a board of directors of a corporation, and we do a real-time simulation.

Shely : The main focus [of NCSC] is obviously the committees and the crises that we’re working on, but then we also have speakers coming from D.C. who are experts on the topics, and we’re also doing embassy trick-or-treating and other daytime, and especially evening, social events that let the delegates get to know each other and experience everything that D.C. has to offer.

Lopesciolo: There’s a strong social community on the circuit of college-level Model United Nations conferences.

How long have you been working on setting up this conference?

Shely : We were appointed last November, so it’s been almost a year. My position is Executive Director, so I’m focused on all the non-substantive details of the conference. My job more includes getting the speakers to come and logistical details, setting up the schedule and making sure we have food and all [those kinds of things].

Lopesciolo : I’m Secretary General, so I focus on … the staff of [the 18 different simulations] and making sure their ideas are both substantively strong and compatible with the style of debate we do.

Are the 600 visiting delegates representative of different schools and backgrounds?

Shely: We have [people from] about 43 schools coming this year, which is more schools than have come to NCSC in the past, so we’re expanding this year.

Lopesciolo: A lot of the schools are from the Boston, Washington, East Coast stretch, but we do have a handful of [people from] schools on the West Coast. … Some from the Midwest, a couple from Canada. Florida and Georgia have a bunch of schools that do it, so it’s definitely nationwide.

What makes this conference unique from others  with a similar focus?

Lopesciolo : On the substantive side, Georgetown is very much known for being very competent, having very substantively strong simulations. … Beyond the top handful of people who are on the secretariat [executive board] of the conference … there are a million and one people who are super interested and super qualified, [who] you don’t see at other conferences. The general staff is really strong, which means the simulations are more realistic, the delegates get feedback more quickly, the information is more detailed, the debates are more complex. Georgetown’s really known for — from top secretariat Christie and myself down to your average freshman staffer — being stronger than almost anywhere else you see.

Shely : We’re also in a unique position by being able to take advantage of everything D.C. offers in terms of international affairs. This is the perfect place to be for a conference like this because we can have actual State Department officials coming and talking about the issues in the countries we’re debating on.

Lopesciolo : It’s also known as one of the most logistically sound, smoothly run conferences that there is, arguably the single most.

Shely : We try to make it as fun and easy for the delegates as possible, as well as the staff and make sure everything runs well, and they have a good time all weekend.

When does it begin and end?

Shely : We’re going to move in on Tuesday, [the 25th]. Our senior staff will arrive on Wednesday, the 26th, and the rest of the staff and the delegates will arrive on Thursday, the 27,th and we’ll do opening ceremonies and welcome everyone to the conference. We’ll start committees that night, and then that will run through Sunday when we have our closing ceremonies in the afternoon.

Lopesciolo : So it runs four days, with Friday and Saturday starting at 9 a.m. with committee sessions and ending with social events that go until 1 a.m. or 2 a.m.

So, what are you guys going to do once this is done?

Shely : Probably a lot of sleep and homework … make sure our friends know we’re alive still … but it’s nice, because I’ve made some of my best friends doing this, so it’s nice because everyone will be there this weekend.

Lopesciolo : [Christie and I] had spoken, like, twice before we were appointed to our positions.

Shely : Now, we’re … rarely apart.

Lopesciolo : And that’s probably not going to change after the conference.