ICONS USER MANUAL Directed by Jonathan Wilkenfeld Department of Government and Politics University of Maryland College Park, MD 20742 (301) 405-4172 icons@bss2.umd.edu http://www.icons.umd.edu Developed Under the Auspices of the U.S. Department of Education International Business Machine Corporation University of Maryland Maryland State Department of Education National Council on Foreign Language and International Studies DRAFT: August 31, 1998 Copyright 1998, Project ICONS, University of Maryland ICONS User Manual Table of Contents Overview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .1 Introduction. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .1 Rationale for the Approach. . . . . . . . . . . . . . .2 How the Simulation Works. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .3 Role of the Facilitator . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .4 Connecting to ICONS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .6 Simulation Methodology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .6 Early Simulation Trials . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .6 ICONS Simulations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .8 Structure of an ICONS Simulation . . . . . . . . . . . . . .9 Preparation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .9 Simulation. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10 Debriefing and Evaluation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11 Implementation Issues. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12 Country-Team Roles. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12 Team Organization . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14 Decision-Making Procedures. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15 Scenario. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17 Position Papers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18 Communication Procedures. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20 Foreign Language. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21 Umpiring. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23 Grades. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24 Revisiting the Facilitator's Role . . . . . . . . . . 25 Appendix . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27 ICONS Bibliography. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27 Position Paper Outline. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30 Debriefing Questions. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32 Overview This document is intended to guide faculty members in preparing their students to participate in an ICONS simulation. The first section contains a brief introduction to ICONS and what is required to participate. The following sections contain a history of simulations used in the international relations classroom, a more detailed description of the structure of an ICONS simulation, and a discussion of various issues related to implementing ICONS in a class. For more information about ICONS -- including past and current simulation scenarios, registration information, and a research library -- please access the ICONS website at http://www.icons.umd.edu. Introduction The ICONS Project is an interdisciplinary effort that uses simulation techniques to teach international negotiation and intercultural communication skills to college and high school students. Housed at the University of Maryland, the project implements a world-wide, multi-institution, computer-assisted simulation network that thrusts students into the world of high-powered international negotiations. ICONS lets students:  Create and test negotiation strategies  Understand the interdependence of international issues  Appreciate cultural differences and approaches to world problems  Work in teams to solve problems  Use computers for multinational communication. Created by Jonathan Wilkenfeld and Richard D. Brecht of the University of Maryland, College Park, ICONS began as a tool for helping students gain a better grasp of the complexity of international issues. Each year, ICONS runs simulations involving more than 100 colleges, universities, and secondary schools in the United States and throughout the world. Its main purpose is to broaden students' perspectives and make them aware of what it is like to negotiate interconnected global problems from the perspectives of various nations. Participants learn not only what is involved in governmental decision-making, but more importantly, what it feels like to be a decision-maker for a foreign government with a very different set of cultural constraints. As they attempt to implement policy initiatives and resolve international disputes, students confront foreign policy issues in a context that provides an authenticity of experience unobtainable in other educational settings. Each simulation lasts three to five weeks, and is set in the contemporary world projected forward about 6 months to allow an original simulated world to develop. A scenario, which launches the exercise, outlines the state of the world based on present-day facts. The simulation offers students the opportunity to explore such foreign policy issues as international debt, nuclear proliferation, human rights, trade, and the global environment, and regional conflict areas such as the Middle East and Europe. Finally, the ICONS Project meets the broadly acknowledged need to bring technology in to the social science and humanities classroom. Through their participation in the simulation, students learn to use the computer in a concrete way, as a work instrument. Moreover, the application of information technology in the simulation resembles its use in the real world of international relations. It is the interaction of these substance and skill areas that makes the simulation an especially effective instructional tool. Rationale for the Approach The simulation mode of instruction has proven to be an excellent vehicle for immersing students into the world of foreign affairs. Cast in the roles of national decision-makers, they must deal with foreign policy issues in a constantly changing environment. As negotiations proceed and other teams reject or modify initial bargaining strategies, students are continually forced to reassess their country's position, using new information introduced as the simulated world unfolds. ICONS is based on the notion that students need to develop greater awareness of alternative policy options and the linkages among issues confronting nations. Moreover, as their perspectives expand so does their understanding of, and appreciation for, cultural differences and national approaches to problem-solving. It is this widening of vision, the deepening of insight, and the refinement of skills that students claim are the most valuable lessons of the simulation. The ICONS simulation exercises create a worldwide laboratory in which a personal computer becomes an educational tool to link students in classrooms around the world. The accessibility of computer terminal and the "friendliness" of the whole process make participation in the simulation exercise enjoyable, instructive, and cost effective. A recent evaluation of ICONS reported that the simulation experience is an overwhelmingly successful one. Participating students report that their understanding of the complexity of international issues increased at the same time that their perception of the world as being divided into "we" and "they" decreased. They also reported an increased sensitivity to cultural and linguistic differences and a greater understanding of the different perspectives that nations bring to negotiating situations. While most teams cannot claim to have "solved" a global crisis by the end of the simulation, they come away with a clearer understanding of the countries they represent. In addition, they agree uniformly that their participation has made them more aware of the many pitfalls and difficulties of achieving global harmony. A bibliography of publications on the ICONS Project and its precursors appears in the Appendix. How the Simulation Works ICONS is a foreign-policy oriented simulation that has been found to be an excellent vehicle for involving students in complex decision-making contexts. The simulation is capable of supporting 20-25 country teams, each of which can be located at different universities or high schools, linked via the Internet to a central server at the University of Maryland. It is flexible in its construction, incorporating real world current events into each tailored scenario. The simulation software (ICONSnet) is capable of processing the daily flow of messages among teams, and can classify, store, retrieve, and analyze these messages either during or subsequent to a particular exercise, and supports real-time computer conferencing. Finally, ICONS incorporates a sophisticated monitoring and control capability so that those directing the exercise can maintain contact with its diverse elements. Although the ICONS simulation network uses advanced computer technology and software, the system the student-participants actually use is quite simple to operate. For a given country-team, there are three basic activities:  Receiving messages: A student (representing the country-team) accesses the system from his or her local computer (whether in a classroom, computer lab, or at home) via the Internet. After logging in, the student can click a button -- "Read New Messages" -- to pull up the text of all incoming messages for that team which have been sent since the last time the team read its mail.  Sending messages: By clicking another button -- "Send Message" -- the teams can send messages throughout the simulation network. A student can either enter the text of a message directly in the on-screen form or can "cut and paste" to the form from his or her word processor. Once entered, the text is sent to its recipient(s) instantaneously, where it waits in the simulation database until the receiving team signs on to read its messages.  Conferencing: One of the unique features of the ICONS system is its real-time conferencing capability. Two or more country-teams at different locations can sign on simultaneously and communicate with each other in real-time. As teams submit conference statements, they receive statements from the other conference participants. Students can also easily review the text of messages that they have "archived", as well as past conferences. The simulation is launched by a scenario, which represents the differing perspectives of countries on a variety of international issues, setting the stage for the interactions both within and among country teams. During recent runs of the simulation, the scenarios focused on the following problem areas in contemporary international relations:  The spread of nuclear weapons technology and the implications for the stability of the international system;  Human rights;  World health, including nutrition, population, and AIDS;  The impact of environmental issues on the global agenda;  Chemical, biological, and conventional weapons control;  Foreign debt restructuring;  Foreign aid and development;  European integration;  Narcotics trafficking;  International trade. Typically, a simulation lasts about three to five weeks with as many as 3,000 messages exchanged among country-teams during that period. In addition to routine diplomatic communications, computer-assisted real-time conferences are conducted among the major actors in various issue areas. Scheduled conferences focus on each of the issues in the simulation. They follow a detailed agenda and are moderated by ICONS staff. After the simulation, the on-line retrieval capability is ideally suited for supporting student research projects and for evaluating student performance. It is possible, for example, to review message chains to assess the success of a particular negotiating strategy. The evaluation process has proven enormously instructive for students and instructors alike. Role of the Facilitator Regardless of the way the simulation is brought into the classroom, it is the faculty facilitator -- the teacher -- who plays a major role in shaping and tailoring the learning opportunities offered in each individual setting. The facilitator is expected to be a resource for the students, and should have the ability to direct students to the information and materials necessary for them to develop their nation's positions on international problems, or to translate messages effectively. The facilitator's key role is that of questioner -- motivating the team and encouraging dialogue and debate, with the ultimate goal of helping the students gain an appreciation for the complexity of the intercultural negotiation process. Outside of the classroom, the facilitator is responsible for organizing the simulation at his or her institution. Several months before the simulation is set to begin, project staff will send a questionnaire soliciting information regarding participation in the simulation: dates of availability and country-team preferences. Based upon the responses, ICONS project staff then assign country-teams and determine which languages will be used in that particular simulation. This information is then conveyed to the participants the semester before the simulation will run. The scenario, which highlights the issues of interest to the countries represented in the simulation, is then written, and made available to you at the beginning of the semester of the simulation. As the faculty facilitator, your job is to ensure that the country-team is well prepared to participate in the simulation. Specific activities include the following: Before the Simulation:  Coordinating country-team assignments with project staff.  Testing the computer hardware and software well before the simulation to ensure that they are working properly.  Preparing your students for the simulation through lectures, research reports, etc. During the Simulation:  Monitoring your team to ensure a reasonable message flow and to see that its messages are of good quality in terms of content, plausibility, and diplomatic/professional language.  Maintaining contact with project staff. At the Close of the Simulation:  Debriefing your students on the simulation experience.  Helping your students see the relationships between the preparatory course work and the actual simulation exercise.  Having your students perform final research projects based on their simulation participation.  Evaluating the impact of the simulation on students' perception of the international system. Although this might seem like a monumental effort on your part, facilitators in previous exercises have told us they experience a great deal of satisfaction in seeing their students so greatly motivated by a learning experience. Keep in mind that extra effort is needed when introducing any new course. The ICONS simulation is no exception, but the first time through is the most difficult. Once instituted, the simulation becomes much easier to maintain. Connecting to ICONS The simulation runs by linking participating universities or high schools to a World Wide Web server at the University of Maryland via the Internet. A participating school must at the minimum have access to a computer, an Internet connection, and a web browser, such as Netscape Navigator or Microsoft Internet Explorer. (While a graphical browser is preferable, ICONSnet was designed to be compatible with text-based browsers in order to support users with older computers or disabilities.) A printer and word processing software (for preparing messages in advance) are also recommended. Please feel free to contact ICONS staff with any questions you may have about hardware or software configurations. Simulation Methodology Early Simulation Trials In the field of international relations, the group of kindred activities referred to as "political gaming," "simulation games", "crisis games", "computer simulations" and the like, has been around in one form or another for several decades. It has its roots in such intellectual traditions as military strategy, diplomatic analysis, international relations scholarship, organizational sociology, operations research, economics, and computer science. One way of distinguishing these various types of simulation activities from one another is to categorize them by the role played by the "machine" or computer. The simulation exercises used in the ICONS Project grow out of a type of simulation that in its original form was not closely associated with computers. Sometimes referred to as "all-man" simulations, they originated with policy-oriented people more interested in understanding particular situations than in the discovery of scientific generalizations. Their aim was to capture more of the complexity and subtlety of international political issues through the use of fairly detailed scenarios, which focused on real or plausible policy problems. These simulation games were played for periods of varying length; but an entire game seldom represented more than a few weeks of actual calendar time, during which most of the variables at the systems level of analysis were assumed to be relatively unchanged. Unlike "man-machine" simulations, which cast the computer in a central role, these simulations were "free-form", with country-teams often staffed by foreign policy experts and area specialists, whose decisions were constrained not by the rigid input requirements of a computer model, but rather by judgmental considerations of plausibility. Much of the thrust of the efforts with man-machine simulation in international relations was social scientific in spirit. The goal was the development of a body of explicit, systematic, empirical theory. Scholars like Guetzkow, whose work on the "Inter-Nation Simulation" had so much impact on subsequent developments, were interested in the development of a reliable and valid experimental tool. Replicability was essential to this purpose. The emphasis in this work was on systematically modeling the decisional environment for participating decision makers. The ICONS simulation exercises can be traced back to a hybrid form, closer in spirit to the free-form games of the all-man paradigm, but relying for their success interactive computing, which enable human participants at distant locations to negotiate with each other through the assistance of a computer-based communications network. The earliest trials of this type of simulation exercise were performed by Professor Robert C. Noel of the University of California at Santa Barbara. His aim was to see whether the game would retain its essential elements if the participants were physically removed from one another. The first "distributed" games used a scenario based on a nuclear proliferation theme and set in the Middle East circa 1973. The participating country-teams were students in undergraduate courses in international relations at various universities in California. Despite their primitive nature, these early trials removed any doubt about the basic feasibility of distributed gaming exercises. While the dynamics of the interactions were altered, they were not distorted by the new medium. The addition of inter-location competition clearly represented a new dimension for the exercises. Since then, the enormous expansion of international computing networks and declining hardware and communication costs have brought the exercises within the means of most institutions. Several conclusions can be drawn about the feasibility of distributed gaming -- from a variety of perspectives. Although not all early exercises were unqualified successes, the overall experience with them has firmly established the feasibility of the concept. Technical feasibility, which was a problem in the early days, is no longer in question. Neither is there any remaining doubt about the behavioral feasibility of the idea -- that is, whether the total package can evoke the desired forms of human behavior in an appropriate manner. The simple facts are that distributed political gaming does work and that the quality is independent of the communications medium. Participants in the simulation exercises have reported an increase in student motivation to be a major benefit. The exercises are also said to enhance conceptual insight. They foster the development of an analytic approach to policy evaluation. They help to bridge the gap between theory and practice. They promote empathetic understanding and provide relevance to other course and instructional materials that potentially lack them. Most importantly, the exercises foster a better understanding on the part of students of the interdependency of issues and systems. One of the great strengths of the simulation methodology lies in the fact that it brings faculty and students from different schools and in different courses together in meaningful intellectual activities. They do so in ways that do not make sense from a single campus perspective. Most curricula include, in addition to courses in general international relations, specialized courses in the foreign policy of key nations and in foreign policy issues, such as arms control and disarmament or the international economic order. In any one academic term, however, only a subset of these courses can actually be taught. Given considerations of size of faculty, estimated enrollments, course load and preferences, and curriculum balance, the latitude for coordinating some of the more specialized courses is often limited. What the simulation exercises offer is access to scholars and courses at other campuses whose similar interests allow an exploration of the international system otherwise unavailable. In sum, the demonstration of the complexity and interdependence of the international system is made feasible through the application of inter-departmental cooperation. ICONS Simulations The early 1980s were a period of transition for the ICONS simulation. During that time, the software was enhanced and ported first to a VAX on the University of California at Berkeley system, and then to the University of Maryland, where it ran on a PDP-11/44, and later on a Micro VAX II. The redesigned POLNET II software used until 1997 ran on a DEC-Station 5000 on ULTRIX 4.2, with users maintaining a constant connection to the system through telnet. While POLNET II well supported the needs of simulation participants, it was far more cumbersome for users than the graphical user interfaces which had become quite common by the early 1990s. Consequently, ICONS set out to make the system more intuitive and user-friendly, as well as reduce the burden on the users of maintaining a constant connection to the ICONS server. By 1995, the World Wide Web and related technologies made it possible for us to provide users with an easy-to-use interface and minimal local computer requirements. ICONS developed an entirely new software package that replicated and enhanced the essential features of POLNET II in a web-based application. ICONSnet, which debuted in 1997, is written in Oracle PL/SQL and runs on Oracle Database and Oracle Application Server. All that is required to access the system is an Internet connection and a web browser. Many faculty members have reported that ICONSnet enriches the students' learning experience because they can now concentrate on their simulation negotiations without having to worry about technological demands. The number of participating institutions has increased, both in the United States and abroad, so that a typical ICONS exercise involves as many as 25 universities or high schools representing more than 20 country-teams, and as many as 750 participating students. Since 1990, 162 universities and 129 secondary schools from 37 countries have participated in ICONS simulations. Structure of an ICONS Simulation A typical simulation exercise can be divided into three distinct phases: (1) preparation; (2) simulation; and (3) debriefing and evaluation. In the sections below, we will discuss each of these phases in turn. Some of the processes will be further elaborated in the Implementation section below. Preparation As we have indicated, the most typical setting for participation in an ICONS exercise is a course in comparative foreign policy, international politics, or current events. The simulation then becomes part of the substantive content of the course itself, as concepts developed in lectures and readings are employed by students during their participation in the exercise. It is most beneficial to have approximately 6 weeks of preparation before the simulation begins. This is not always necessary, but we have found that both students and faculty need a relatively long stretch of time for preparation. The key to preparation for the exercise is the scenario, which is given to all participating faculty members at the beginning of the semester. Each student should receive a copy of the scenario. The scenario, to be addressed later in more detail, lays out the basic assumptions about the international system and the major actors and issues, serving as a guide for the students in their preparation. It will outline the issues and actors in the simulation. (Examples of recent scenarios can be found on the ICONS website at http://www.icons.umd.edu.) Students should then begin general research into the foreign policy of the nation they will represent. The scenario will help guide the students in terms of the key issues to be addressed, the major actors, and the current policy strategies. During this part of the semester, at least a portion of the lectures should be devoted to issues in foreign policy decision-making, such as the relative impact of personality, domestic, economic, and international factors on the shaping of foreign policy. Once the scenario has been read and absorbed by the students, the second task in this phase is the preparation of a position paper. The position paper, which is discussed below, is meant to spell out the particular country-team's positions on the issues raised in the scenario. Since the scenario is set approximately six months int he future, the position paper will have to deal both with the status of the country's current policy as well as its proposed policy initiatives. It is meant to be a rough policy guide for the team during the course of the exercise, and should remain confidential. This document must be prepared prior to the start of the exercise itself. A third aspect of the preparatory phase is the question of organization (again, to be dealt with below). By organization, we mean the division of the country-team members into functional specializations, so as to optimize the personnel at hand. Thus, after some common readings and group discussions at the beginning of the semester, the team members will divide into groups on the basis of issues, regions, upcoming negotiations, etc. We have found that this is the best way for students to utilize the limited personnel and time at their disposal, during both the preparation and simulation phases. Another set of activities to be undertaken during this preparatory phase has to do with acquiring familiarity with accessing the World Wide Web and the ICONSnet system. While none of this is very difficult in and of itself, and many students may arrive in the course with considerable computer skills, it pays to spend some time on this so that all students are functioning at an adequate level prior to the beginning of the exercise. During the preparation phase, it is of vital importance that faculty read their mail on the faculty communication system at least once a week. ICONS staff will use the "faculty community" to alert you to important simulation developments, such as scenario updates and conference schedules. Simulation Before the simulation begins, the students should have had adequate opportunity to master the issues raised in the scenario, divide themselves up into functional working units, prepare a rather detailed position paper, and familiarize themselves with ICONSnet. Several distinct types of communication take place in the exercise. Messages are the primary form of communications, either bilateral or multilateral, and it is in this context that most of the business of the exercise is conducted. In addition, communiques are routinely issued by country-teams as the need arises, at least twice per week. These are meant to be official public statements of policy on specific issues, and are sent to all other country-teams (unlike regular messages, which may be sent to a more restricted group of countries). Real-time conferences are the final means of communication. While issues are handled through the normal message flow, there is usually a need for a conference to hammer out details of a particular negotiation, or at least to give some issues a public airing. Thus, conferences might take place on issues like arms control, international development, and other global issues. (A conference schedule is distributed to participants before the simulation begins. It is not possible to schedule conferences to coincide with class times, but ICONS does take vacation schedules into account. Further, the number of time zones spanned by a given simulation may complicate scheduling, but project staff tries to minimize inconvenience for the participating teams.) The simulation is administered by a member of the ICONS staff. SIMCON (Simulation Control) is responsible for monitoring all messages (providing feedback when necessary), chairing all conferences, and managing all administrative issues. SIMCON keeps in touch with faculty members so that they can work together to enhance the students' educational experience. (For more information about SIMCON's role in the simulation, please see Umpiring under Implementation Issues below.) As might be imagined, while the faculty involved in the preparation of the simulation may have certain ideas as to the directions various issues and negotiations will take, after the first few days each exercise takes off and develops a character of its own. It is this evolution, and the students' ability to take over the exercise and turn it in unforeseen directions, which makes this type of simulation such a powerful and effective educational tool. Simulations rarely end with closure on any particular issue or problem. Students at both the high school and college levels are often frustrated that closure was not reached. They must be made to understand that the intent is not to resolve all issues, but rather to gain a better appreciation of their complexity, and of the difficulties in achieving consensus among actors with drastically divergent world views. Debriefing is vital in bringing this realization to light. Debriefing and Evaluation The debriefing phase is of critical importance to the overall exercise. During the heat of the exercise, it is often easy to lose sight of the overall process in which the students are participating. During this final stage, faculty and students have an opportunity to reflect on their experience and try to abstract from it useful pieces of information. It is at this point that the student should come to realize that it was not the information about a specific country which he or she gained during the exercise, although that was probably considerable, but rather the insight into the process itself that was the most important thing to take away from the experience. Three aspects of the debriefing phase are dealt with here: evaluation, group discussion, and the final paper. While a formal, written evaluation of the experience is not absolutely critical, we have found that some form of evaluation helps to tie things together, to focus upon the successes of the experience, as well as to point out areas in which changes and improvements must be made. In combination with a pretest, such an evaluation can also serve the purpose of demonstrating areas in which students' perspectives on their own country as well as the rest of the world have changed as a result of this experience. (Contact ICONS for a sample evaluation form.) We have also found that group discussion is effective in highlighting key issues. During the course of such sessions, the faculty facilitator might try to focus the discussion on certain key issues or processes and to draw students out on their experiences more generally. In a debriefing, the facilitator will help the students to evaluate what they have learned through participation and relate these experiences to the "real world". The Appendix contains a suggested list of debriefing questions that we have used successfully at the University of Maryland. Finally, we recommend that students be asked to write brief papers as a way of concluding the exercise. To facilitate various types of analytic exercises, the entire simulation community database is opened to all country-teams, so that they can read each other's mail, and generally sleuth around in the system. They can do systematic retrieval of messages by keywords or subject. Thus, they may want to write a paper on the different ways they approached issues, the characteristics of crisis decision making, and the like. In addition, the students can also be asked at this point to apply some of the principles of foreign policy and international politics that were the subject of early lectures to the actual processes they observed in the simulation: how did the principles and simulation experience differ, was the simulation perhaps too simplistic or inaccurate, or are some of the theories and principles in need of modification? Implementation Issues Country-Team Roles Typically, when one thinks of simulation and gaming exercises, one has images of the model United Nations or of mock legislatures, in which students engage in role playing. In the ICONS simulation exercises, a more analytic, if possibly less dramatic, mode of participation is encouraged. Stylistic mimicry is discouraged because it tends to perpetuate stereotypical perceptions of foreign policy behavior. What is important is for students to think about the situations posed by the scenario and developments within the simulation from the point of view of the nation they represent in the exercise. The aim of the simulation is to produce good analysts, not good actors, by encouraging students to evaluate foreign policy in the following manner: "If I were making foreign policy decisions for nation X, and if a particular situation occurred, then I would have to take the following considerations into account. . .; I would conclude that such and such a course of action is the most desirable." Consistent with this approach, the participant is asked to view his or her role as being analogous to the kinds of high-level advisors and staff that are found in most foreign ministries or other foreign policy making structures. Two sets of activities are involved: 1) policy planning and analysis, and 2) policy implementation and operations. For this reason, students are encouraged from the very beginning of the semester to consult a variety of general economic, political, and military sources so that by the time the simulation begins, they will have developed a sound research content for their policy decisions. The participant wears a "planner's hat" prior to the beginning of the exercise, and focuses his or her attention on the creation of the "position paper." Once the simulation has begun, the participant functions as a policy implementer, that is, one who works in day-to-day operations, initiating and responding to situations within the policy guidelines set down in the position paper. This distinction parallels the classic "staff-line" distinction in administrative agencies. In practice, it is bound to become blurred: many statements of policy cannot be implemented in concrete situations, and many concrete situations emerge for which there are no existing policy guidelines. Nonetheless, it will be instructive for the participant to develop an awareness of the two different functions the team must perform as the exercise unfolds. Given this conception of the role of country-teams, certain assumptions must be made about decision-making and societal factors in the various countries being played in the exercise. For example, although country-teams do not directly represent internal elements of their nations, e.g., legislatures, public opinion, and the like, decisions made by students should be assumed to have met domestic policy constraints. To this end, we think it is useful to have a country-team member specialize in domestic politics. This person generally will have an overview of all aspects of the country-team's policies, and will be able to veto decisions that are not feasible within a domestic context. Student participants are often a bit confused as to how much freedom they have in developing their nation's foreign policies. For example, must the U.S. team strictly adhere to the policies set forth by the current administration? Or is the U.S. team allowed to diverge from those policies? In response to these questions, we generally respond that each country-team must maintain a certain degree of accuracy so that others in the simulation can expect a minimal level of realism. All students will have researched the positions of their negotiating partners and they should be able to expect realistic positions from the other teams. Still, the simulation seeks a degree of creativity in developing solution to the issues that might diverge from policies the countries have pursued to date. Ultimately, the policies and strategies developed by the team are subject to review by either the local instructor or simulation control or both. The team's policies and strategies should be construed as recommendations which will generally be translated directly into actions by the teams, but which, on occasion, may not be accepted as is. This review function is not intended to thwart the team's initiatives. Rather, it is a means for the instructor and/or simulation control to encourage students to concentrate on certain problems, to assure that the game as a whole maintains focus, and to prevent a team from becoming entangled in tangential issues. The extent to which the review function is exercised by either a local instructor or simulation control varies from exercise to exercise, depending upon the focus, objectives, and level of participants. Team Organization ICONS simulation interaction requires that each team provide input and output in the exercise. How the team organizes itself to provide that input and output is up to each campus group to decide. In the past, some teams have operated as informal small groups, involving little or no division of labor and structuring of authority and responsibility. Other teams have been highly structured internally. Generally, some structure has seemed to work better than complete informality. A few suggestions are listed below. Division of Labor: Typically, one or more students will specialize in either a particular geographic area covered in the scenario (for example, European specialist(s) on the Chinese team) or a functional area (such as, trade or global environmental policy). There have also been relational specialties: for example, U.S. team specialists on Sino-Russian relations. A note of caution is in order, however. If all of the members of a team have specialized foci, something akin to "the five blind men and the elephant problem" is likely to arise. "Each individual may become quite familiar with his or her part of the elephant but no one person will know what the whole elephant looks like." We have experimented with a "generalist" role on some teams. This position is useful, but it tends to create a new problem: the generalist often does less substantive research than do the specialists on the team. The generalists also tend to rely more on intuition than on acquired knowledge of the nation's foreign policy. Particularly when the team is representing a country that is not its own, this development runs counter to the goal of building some sort of intercultural awareness. A second strategy for dealing with the part/whole elephant problem is to require that all participants on a team read the same general foreign policy material about their nations prior to beginning their research on the specialized area. This strategy has proven successful, in part because it provides a firmer base upon which to begin individual research. It gives individuals a recognizable context to contemplate specialized portions of a nation's foreign policy and also results in a more coherent end product, in the form of the position paper. Internal Conflict Resolution: Another problem of team organization may also arise: that of internal conflict resolution. It is to be expected that a group of specialists trying to arrive at a single policy line for a particular problem may have substantial differences of opinion. The more involved they become, the more they might be inclined to fight for their positions. Impasses are not uncommon. To handle such situations, we recommend the following strategies. First, a team should be encouraged to establish early on in its preparation period some form of decision rule for such instances. Most teams end up using either majority rule or consensus for general issues that are important enough to require consideration by the whole team. For more minor decisions, teams often require that at least two or three others on the team outside the area of specialization relating to the decision approve the item before it can become part of the team's foreign policy. Generally, establishment of such rules at the start of a team's decision-making process will eliminate most of the major conflicts that arise within teams. Nonetheless, there are occasionally times when even the use of the above approaches does not resolve internal team conflict. In these instances a team's facilitator should have the authority to arbitrate the dispute. Simulation control (SIMCON) can be called in by the facilitator to aid in the arbitration if needed. Such conflicts, if used by the facilitator effectively, can provide worthwhile illustrations of the domestic policy process and thus be handled thoughtfully. It is essential that conflicting parties be required to give a thorough rationale for their policy choice. The facilitator can then help the students to evaluate more effectively the costs and benefits of the various options. It is more important that the students become good policy evaluators than it is for one party in the conflict to feel that he or she has won and the other has lost. Team Assignments: Those institutions fielding more than one country-team in any individual simulation have an additional problem at the very start of the course: how to assign students to a particular country-team. Not surprisingly, students invariably clamor to represent a country they perceive to be powerful, and it is sometimes difficult to coax students to join country-teams about which they know very little at the start. To help resolve such questions, an experience survey can be used as a basis for assigning students to country-teams. For example, if a student responds that he has completed a course in economic development, he might be placed on a lesser developed country; similarly, if a student has taken a course in Chinese foreign policy she might be assigned to the Chinese team, on the assumption that such background would be more likely to produce reasoned rather than merely chauvinistic positions on the issues raised in the course of the simulation. Decision-Making Procedures General team meetings have proven most useful. They are usually held once or twice a week during the preparation period and three to five times a week during the simulation period. It is recommended that an agenda be followed in these meetings in order to prevent the meetings from turning into "bull sessions." It is also recommended that someone perform the role of chairperson of these meetings. It is most beneficial for the facilitator to take this role during a team's preliminary meetings. A team member should take over this role once the team has progressed to a point of solid organization and has a substantive knowledge base from which to work. This generally happens a few weeks before the start of the simulation. It is suggested that the instructor attend at least some of the meetings that he or she does not chair. After the team is organized, at least four functions can usefully be served by these general team meetings. First, an overall position paper must be assembled at the outset which: a) identifies a plausible set of broad foreign policy goals for the country in the simulation time period; b) relates the situation in the scenario to these goals, identifying the central issues; and c) charts guidelines for obtaining these objectives. More detailed suggestions for preparation of the team position paper are discussed below. Second, once the exercise has begun, the general meetings serve to assure that the various specialists will be exposed to each other's ideas and provide a forum for coordination and integration. The educational values of this aspect of the general meetings are particularly important. Third, the general meetings also provide an opportunity for the whole team to review the actions that various team members have taken since the last meeting. Finally, these general meetings will also enable the team as a whole to revise and design new policy guidelines -- to update the position paper -- as the situation unfolds throughout the exercise, especially in response to updates of the scenario (which will be issued by simulation control from time to time). In summary, then, the general meetings serve as a forum for reiterative cycles of planning-coordination-review-revision. Ad Hoc Meetings: Both during the pre-simulation planning and throughout the exercise, ad hoc meetings of subsets of the team have also proven essential for good policy integration and coordination. These may involve relevant subgroups within the team, depending on the particular question(s) that arise. The participants may fall within one specialized area or they may cut across specialties: for example, a meeting between an economic policy specialist and a Chinese policy specialist on the Japanese team. The need for an ad hoc meeting may arise at any time, for example, when a Middle East specialist, who is retrieving messages, receives a communique which requires quick action on a matter dealing with debt restructuring. The appropriate people will have to be consulted, perhaps in an ad hoc meeting, perhaps by e-mail or telephone. In this regard, it is helpful to post a list of each member's e-mail address and phone number and distribute it among team members. Monitoring Message Traffic: It is vital that the team makes sure that it keeps up with communications on a regular basis. This means that at least one person from the team must login to the simulation community each day during the simulation period to receive any messages addressed to the team. Most groups have found it convenient to distribute this workload by scheduling particular students to log in at specific times. (In practice though, as more and more students have easy access to a computer, we find that many team members log in to read and send messages on a daily basis.) The person(s) checking messages may simply direct incoming information to the appropriate team specialists and enter into the system outgoing messages which have been prepared by others prior to the scheduled period. (Again, though, it is increasingly common for each person or sub-group to send the messages that they themselves have prepared.) In some cases, the person checking the message may have to make a direct response to another country on an issue other than the one he or she specializes -- all the more reason for each participant to be thoroughly familiar with the policy guidelines developed by the group as a whole. Another note of caution: experience teaches that a balance between individual initiative and coordination with one's teammates is essential to a smoothly functioning team. The literature on foreign policy decision making illustrates that this problem is encountered, not only in gaming exercises, but in actual foreign offices. In a simulation community, the entire team logs in using the same username and password. ICONSnet was designed to facilitate an entire team sharing an account. When a student logs in, he or she may choose to read all new messages, selected new messages, or new messages associated with a particular simulation issue. After reading the message, the student can choose whether to keep the message on the list of new messages for other team members to see or to send it to the archives for later access. (ICONSnet allows participants to search the archives to find messages according to a number of parameters, including message number, date, send, recipient, and issue.) Scenario The heart of any simulation exercise, be it in a simple small-group setting or an elaborate multiple participant, multi-location exercise such as ICONS, is the simulation scenario. (Examples from past semesters are available from the ICONS website.) The scenario sets the stage for the interactions that will take place both within and among teams. It defines the issues, the central actors, and the time-frame within which the exercise will be played out. Scenarios vary in their complexity, ranging from very detailed "historical" settings to simple decision-making situations. Participant roles may be explicitly defined or left vague. These differences in approach are decided upon by the simulation coordinators and depend upon the issues involved and the focus of the various curricula into which the simulation is incorporated. The ICONS scenarios have been developed with an eye toward creating unavoidable issues with which the simulation participants must grapple. Typically, the scenario is set at some point in the not too distant future, to prevent students from taking their moves out of the daily newspaper, while at the same time not allowing them to stray too far from the reality of their country-teams' past and present foreign policies. The goal has been to make the simulation scenarios as realistic as possible, while at the same time injecting them with sufficient urgency to keep all participating units on their toes and active. The simulation exercise is designed to take on an identity of its own, and while the scenario is a convenient starting point, developments will often leave it behind. A well-designed scenario quite frequently pushes the simulation beyond the critical issues it initially establishes. The scenario can be single or multiple-issue in scope, depending upon the pedagogical needs of the instructors involved and the resources available to participants and faculty. In the past most of the exercises have been four to five week multiple-issue exercises addressing topics ranging from arms control to Third World development to specific regional tensions. However, for the past few years, we have been conducting more narrowly focused regionally-based simulations, lasting three weeks. These exercises and their scenarios allowed an in-depth exploration of the particular issues involved. Thus, while not providing as clear an image of the whole picture of international relations, participants in the mini-simulations were able to get a firmer grasp of the dynamics within the scope of their exercise. As mentioned above, the ICONS simulation places the international system at some point in the future, and then proceeds to simulate the daily interchange of messages and communiques among the participants, over a three to five week period. As a consequence, one should not expect dramatic developments on all fronts during the course of the exercise. After all, how many dramatic events take place during a typical four-to-five-week period of diplomatic history? Students should be constantly reminded, particularly if they become disturbed at the slow pace at which events unfold, that this is not a game to be won or lost. Rather, like the system it simulates, it is an ongoing process, and few issues or problems will be resolved during a typical simulation exercise. Under ideal circumstances, the scenario for an ICONS simulation should be available for distribution to students at the beginning of the semester or trimester. Students should also be assigned to country-teams at that time, so that they can begin the process of familiarization with the issues facing the international system in general, and their country in particular. (ICONS has put together an on-line research library at http://www.icons.umd.edu/reslib/ to help students with their research.) These issues will also help determine the appropriate functional and regional divisions for the teams as they attempt to form themselves into efficient decision-making units. Position Papers Each country-team is expected to prepare a position paper prior to the start of the exercise. A copy of the position paper may be submitted to Simulation Control (SIMCON) for review before the beginning date for the exercise. (See the Umpiring section below.) Position papers are not circulated among the country-teams, and should be kept confidential by all team members. As an initial statement of the country-team's posture and plans, the position paper is used as a basis for evaluating the team's subsequent moves. In this vein, SIMCON or the facilitator may attempt to apply a coherence criterion: how does a given action or message sent by a particular team relate to the issues spelled out in the position paper? If this relationship is not readily apparent, SIMCON or the facilitator may ask for an explanation from the team before the communication is allowed to proceed. This may call for a simple clarification; it may lead to the identification of gaps in the initial plan and team analysis; or it may involve the identification of new issues that have arisen in the course of the exercise. When the exercise is over, the position paper can be used by the facilitator to evaluate the participation of the students in the exercise. It will help to tell where the team diverged from the policies stated in the paper and also where the paper may have originally addressed the issues involved inadequately. These instances can be quite useful in the debriefing and discussion sessions after the exercise is finished. Position Paper Guidelines: The facilitator may specify what is to be included in the position paper or the team may wish to use the following set of queries as rough guidelines. In either case, the position paper should be the focus of a great deal of attention by the students. It should be the body of analysis and foreign policy evaluation that each country-team produces and uses during the exercise. The following set of questions provides one approach to the creation of the paper, and are intended to be suggestive but not restrictive. (A more complete position paper outline is available in the Appendix.) The Situation in the Real World  What are the major foreign policy problems confronting the nation your team represents? Pay special attention to your country's relations with the countries listed as "participating teams".  With respect to each of the problem areas identified above, what have been your nation's basic interests and goals? (This item is intended to get at the nation's broad, long-range goals).  In the recent past, what approaches has your country used in pursuit of these goals? (This item is intended to get at the nation's intermediate-range goals).  What diplomatic and/or military strategies have been employed in pursuit of the above listed intermediate-range goals? The Situation for the Simulation as Presented in the Scenario  What situations and problems facing your country suggest a need to reform your country's basic objectives? Intermediate-range goals? Diplomatic and/or military strategies?  What specific actions or policies would result in the best solutions for your nation? What actions are feasible? Which are recommended? On what time schedule? Any follow-up actions?  What responses do you expect your contemplated actions to elicit from other parties? What, if any, should be your nation's counter responses?  What do you expect to be the policy objectives of other nations? How might these objectives complement or run counter to your own?  For each anticipated action by others, what response(s) by the nation you represent would be most appropriate? Ultimately, the position paper is central to the functioning of the exercise and its educational purposes. It can serve as a vehicle for familiarizing the students with the current internal situation of the country in question, as well as acquainting him or her with its current foreign policy and historical background. The position paper is also a planning and analytic document. It encourages the student to do some hard-headed thinking about international relations -- to attempt to identify future trends in the international system, to assume a perspective on world affairs that differs from their peers, to confront some of the complexities involved in translating aspirations into viable policy options, and to realize the difficulty of implementing even the best-laid plans in a complex international environment. We urge all participants to devote as much thought and energy to the position paper as time allows. Communication Procedures A separate discussion of the procedures for using the ICONSnet system is available on-line at http://www.icons.umd.edu/help/. In this section, some of the general features of this system will be discussed, and some common problems examined. All country-teams perform two main communication functions, reading new messages and sending messages. Students should choose "Read New Messages" to retrieve all messages and communiques that have accumulated for the country-team since the last time a team member signed on. This should be done by a designated team member on a regular basis, although all team members should be encouraged to log in and read messages at convenient times. Incoming messages are generally in English (from English speaking country-teams), although they may be in other languages, depending on the particular simulation. (Translations of foreign language messages are provided by language teams. See the Foreign Language section below for more information on translation procedures.) Using the "Send" function, country-teams can send messages and communiques. The sender can specify the recipients, and must classify the message under at least one of the simulation issue areas. Several types of messages are sent by country-teams during the course of the simulation. These can roughly be classified as inter-country exchanges, communiques, and conferences. Inter-country Exchanges: Inter-country exchanges are messages sent from one team to another, dealing with a topic of mutual interest. Such messages may be addressed to a single country (bilateral), to a number of countries (multilateral), or indeed to the entire set of countries in the exercise. Along with the normal diplomatic exchanges among the nations, draft treaties, international agreements, and the statements of positions can also be transmitted in this mode. To illustrate this mode of communication, a recent ICONS simulation involving fourteen universities generated about 2,500 inter-country communications during a five-week period. Among the issues dealt with were global warming, the AIDS crisis, nuclear proliferation, and LDC development. Communiques: Communiques are intended to serve as statements of official positions on the range of issues facing individual country-teams, and are sent to all participants. They can also be used by countries to publicize information they feel should be available to all countries for any number of reasons. Each country-team should issue at least two of these per week during the exercise. Conferences: Face-to-face conferences are not possible in an ICONS simulation owing to the geographical constraints imposed by the variety of institutions participating. However, the ICONS system does facilitate real-time computer conferences to assure that each issue is thoroughly explored. The system can support a real-time conference involving a number of participants from diverse locations. All will be signed on simultaneously, with messages (in English) immediately transmitted to all other members of the conference. Usually several conferences of a general nature are established before the start of an exercise and are listed in the scenario. In the past these conferences have included arms control, international trade, and human rights, among others. Other, more narrowly focused, conferences can be established as the exercise progresses and participants feel that there is a need for one. Such requests are submitted to SIMCON for approval. Such requests should specifically address why communications cannot be accomplished through the normal message flow. One such conference in a past simulation was a bilateral conference between Japan and Mexico to finalize the details of a trade agreement. The groundwork for such a conference would have been prepared through inter-country exchanges. Over the normal message system, discussion of the details of a trade agreement would have taken a great deal more time and was greatly facilitated by these simulated face-to-face negotiations. Given the number of conferences in a simulation and the fact that these will usually not fall during your class time, it is probably not advisable to require students to attend all of the conferences. In general, it makes sense to require students to attend conferences on issues in which they are the team specialists, and maybe one or two others to foster sub-group communication. If a specialist cannot be present for a conference for which he or she has been conducting "regular mail" negotiations, he or she should be responsible for finding and briefing someone else on the team to adequately cover the conference. Experience has shown that conference agendas are an integral part of the success of conferences. Without agendas for discussion in conferences, most sessions move very slowly and accomplish little. SIMCON provides detailed agendas for each pre-established conference at the beginning of the simulation. Additional topics and proposals will be added to the conference agendas as the simulation unfolds. Foreign Language Although English is the standard language for ICONS simulations, some simulations may support the use of other languages other than English. (In the past, communications have taken place in German, Hebrew, Japanese, and Russian, but French and Spanish are the most common foreign languages supported.) The language component is closely linked to the foreign policy aspect of the simulation in several ways. First, a team might choose to send its messages in a language other than English if the simulation will support communication in that language; for example, the country-team simulating Mexico might send its messages in Spanish. (This is done most commonly when there are several teams that wish to use the same language in the simulation, so that the teams can both send .) Second, if the simulation uses a foreign language, many country-teams will receive messages in foreign languages that the students cannot translate. The need to wait for and depend on translations will have a realistic impact on the flow of negotiations. If a school wishes to send a message in a language other than its native language, it is strongly recommended that facilitator make sure that a native speaker is available to review the students' messages to make sure that they are correct and natural in their wording and grammar. The success of the simulation is directly impacted by the quality of the messages sent. If a team relies on a translator with minimal language skills to send its messages, it is possible that those messages will be of such poor quality that the language students who translate them into English will learn very little from their effort. A commitment to send messages in a foreign language should be taken seriously. If a U.S. institution commits itself to sending messages in Spanish, for example, arrangements are then made for Spanish language students to translate those incoming messages. This implies that language students at institutions participating in that simulation will be taking a Spanish translation course for credit. For an ICONS-related language course to be successful, these translation students must have an adequate amount of work to do throughout the course of the simulation. A country-team that decides to send its messages in Spanish must be prepared to send all of its international exchanges and communiques in Spanish; it cannot send in Spanish only when it is convenient to do so. The ultimate success of the simulation experience requires that faculty facilitators understand the impact of their language-related decisions on other aspects of the simulation. Ideally, the process of translating the foreign language message into English should occur at your institution. However, this is not always possible. If language proficient students are unavailable, language students at other participating institutions will provide your team with English translations via the network. No institution should opt out of participating in an ICONS simulation because of foreign language constraints. When foreign language is used, ICONS simulations demonstrate the necessary interplay of diplomacy and language. The imposition of a language "constraint" on participants forces them to confront some of the problems faced by contemporary foreign policy officials. It also introduces students not involved in language study to the cultural nuances manifested in foreign language communications and helps to demonstrate their impact on the foreign policy process. Umpiring Like many other aspects of the simulation process, the umpiring function for ICONS has undergone a significant evolution. Originally, the task of umpiring was viewed in a more formal fashion. SIMCON (Simulation Control) reviewed all messages on the system before their final "send-off". There was an actual lapse between the point at which the team put their message on the system and the judgment on the part of SIMCON as to whether that message should be forwarded or rejected. This was a form of quality control, designed to ensure that all messages satisfied some basic criteria. As one can imagine, however, this task became more and more difficult as the size of ICONS exercises began to grow. We now practice a more informal monitoring of the quality of messages, which we urge individual faculty members to use with their students as well. Specifically, we monitor the daily flow of messages after they are put on the system, and engage in troubleshooting, designed to catch messages that do not meet the following criteria:  Plausibility: A message may be rejected if it is not deemed to be plausible within the context of the game.  Consistency: A message may be rejected because it is deemed to be inconsistent with the policies set forth in the team's position paper. SIMCON's motive here is to get the team to think their move through more carefully.  Clarity: In certain cases, SIMCON will reject a message owing to its imprecision or verbosity.  Appropriateness: Personal insults and undiplomatic language are not tolerated (and often result in other country-teams taking the offender less seriously in the negotiations). Naturally, if a team feels that any action taken by SIMCON is unfair or unwarranted, it is free to engage in a dialogue with the "Control Center." In general, however, we find that most students are willing to revise their initial messages if their faculty facilitator or SIMCON indicates that changes are warranted. We have found that stressing the concepts of plausibility, consistency, clarity, and appropriateness in pre-simulation training can be very helpful. Depending upon the particular students involved, this latter method may be all that is needed to keep the team on track. In short, we hope that a combination of cross checks on the types of messages that the teams are sending will protect the overall quality and integrity of the simulation for all those participating. SIMCON monitors the simulation for problems in message content as well as technical difficulties. However, SIMCON's monitoring should be secondary to the watchful eye of the faculty facilitator. While we encourage facilitators to step back from the team's decision-making process, we hope that they will keep close enough track of their teams' performances to assist when necessary. A team that is allowed to "run wild" can have significant adverse effects on the simulation as a whole. To this end, we ask that faculty keep abreast of simulation developments. In addition to the umpiring function, SIMCON is also responsible for administrative issues with the simulation community and for moderating all conferences. Grades Generally, a process for grading students for their participation in the simulation is developed by the individual facilitator in accordance with his or her particular philosophy. However, we can make the following observations and suggestions. The level of student participation is usually quite high, within the normal range of self-motivation. Generally, most of the students work very hard without instructor-imposed papers and exams. However, because students will always worry about grades, and because this type of course occasionally attracts students looking for a "free ride", we recommend some combination of the following steps:  Essay Exams: Depending on the framework in which the simulation is being conducted, it may be advisable to structure some of the learning around essay exams in which the students are encouraged to delve into the theoretical underpinnings of many of the issues they will face in the negotiation process.  Summary Paper: Having the students write a paper evaluating the process of, and assessing their role in, the simulation is a very useful exercise. Students should be encouraged to take advantage of the fact that the community is "opened" once the simulation ends, so that all teams can read all messages, not just their own.  Peer Evaluations: This type of assessment is very important, given that the students are working in an interdependent team atmosphere. It is useful to administer these evaluations at the conclusion of the exercise, and ask the students to confidentially evaluate those with whom they have had frequent contact during the course of the simulation. Since much of the work that the students do will presumably be done outside of class, these peer evaluations can be extremely valuable. It is essential that the team facilitator have some set methods for evaluating student performance. Coordinators should think out the question of grading in advance, making sure that it is not too subjective and that students thoroughly understand it prior to committing to the simulation. This will eliminate the potential for problems at the conclusion of the exercise. Revisiting the Facilitator's Role Most faculty and students find the three to five week period of the simulation quite demanding in terms of the time and effort it requires. It can be a very exciting time, however, as many of the students become totally absorbed in the experience. Yet it can also be frustrating if proper consideration is not given in advance to the training necessary for a successful and smooth simulation. All faculty should thoroughly experiment with the ICONSnet system prior to the start of the simulation exercise, so that they are familiar with the technical details. It is also important that students be given advance training on the system. Students should be shown how to sign onto the computer and send and receive test messages. This alleviates the tension that can surface during the first week of the simulation if students are attempting to participate substantively in the exercise, but are unable to get past the technical details of the computer. If resources are available, a well-trained graduate or undergraduate assistant can be quite helpful during the course of the simulation. Whenever computers are introduced into the learning environment, it is essential that a support system exist for those students who suffer from "computer jitters". Rapid and irreversible alienation can occur if assistance is not available. Considerable effort should also go into the scheduling of meetings and communications. Typically, all students should be available during the regular time the class is scheduled to meet as a team. We recommend that the students not have access to the computers during scheduled team meetings; they should use class time to meet as a group to discuss policy initiatives and implementation. In a sense, all of the suggestions provided above shed light on the role of the faculty facilitator. What we have discovered over the years is that it takes a great deal of careful planning for students to experience the spontaneity and excitement of the simulation. That planning, however, should largely remain behind-the-scenes. The faculty facilitator must be a resource for the students -- a coordinator of the action rather than an active participant in it. This, of course, is not always easy. The temptation to step in and rewrite a message or decide a policy issue for the team is often quite strong. But we have found that sometimes non-intervention is the best assistance you can provide, allowing students to "own" their actions and the consequences. To recap, the facilitator has several responsibilities.  Arrange your country-team assignment with ICONS staff.  Organize the foreign policy curriculum. This entails producing a syllabus, giving or arranging lectures, etc.  Organize your country-team into an effective and efficient working group.  Act as a resource for your country-team as it prepares its position paper.  Monitor the country-team during the exercise to ensure that the team is involved in the simulation on a daily basis, and that its messages are of high quality both in terms of their content and the use of diplomatic language.  Read mail on the faculty community for simulation updates throughout the exercise.  Debrief the country-team at the conclusion of the simulation and assign final papers. While facilitating your students' participation in an ICONS simulation can be demanding, the rewards to the instructors who venture into this mode of teaching generally far outweigh the extra effort required of them during the critical period in which the exercise is running. Appendix ICONS Bibliography Brecht, R.D., Noel R.C., and Wilkenfeld, J. 1984. "Computer Simulation in the Teaching of Translation and International Studies." Foreign Language Annals, 17:6 Byrnes, J. and J. Torney-Purta. 1995. "Naive Theories and Decision Making as Part of Higher Order Thinking in Social Studies." 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Teaching Political Science, 10. Wilkenfeld, J, and J. Kaufman. 1993. "Political Science: Network Simulation in International Politics." Social Science Computer Review 11:4 (Winter). Position Paper Outline The preparation of a position paper is crucial to a successful ICONS simulation. The position paper not only provides an important opportunity to conduct research on the various substantive topics, but it also allows participants to formulate their policy goals and appropriate negotiating strategies before the simulation begins. This guide will assist in the preparation of this position paper by clarifying the expectations with respect to format and organization. I. The format and organization of the entire position paper. A. The final position paper is the product of a group effort. Therefore, it should be submitted as a unified document rather than as separate submissions from individuals or from issue area working groups. 1. The final document should be produced using one word-processing program. It should be contained in a single file and should be printed as a single document. 2. The format, i.e. margins, etc., of the document should be consistent throughout. B. The final position paper should be as professional of a document as possible. It should contain the following components. 1. A table of contents. 2. An executive summary or overview, which succinctly presents the following: a. The overall national policy goals. b. The broad policy goals for each issue area. c. A brief description of the overall national negotiating strategy. C. Finally, the position paper should not contain any policy recommendations that are contradictory. In other words, the trade section should not recommend a policy of delinking trade from human rights if the human rights section is advocating the use of trade sanctions against a nation for human rights abuses. II. The format and organization of the individual sections. Each section addressing a substantive issue area should contain the following information, presented in this format. A. The substantive issue. 1. What is the significance of the issue at the international level? 2. How is this issue significant to your nation? B. Policy objectives. 1. What are the policy objectives of your nation? 2. If these objectives cannot be reached, what are the secondary or compromise objectives? C. Negotiating strategies. 1. What are the various strategies that could be pursued in the negotiations? A comprehensive paper will provide a variety of strategies. 2. What are the advantages and disadvantages of each strategy? D. Final recommendation. What is the final policy recommendation, in terms of goals and strategies? In addition, each section of the position paper should include a bibliography of all references. The importance of proper references and citations cannot be overstated, as an academic integrity issue as well as for checking original references. Debriefing Questions With the conclusion of the exercise, you are entering a critical period of the simulation process. Debriefing is an essential component of simulation. During debriefing, the students are brought out of their simulated world and made to focus, again, on reality. The following are some questions you may want to raise in your class discussions: l. Many students feel the need to talk about the process itself. They've gone through an intense period of activity; they need to "let off steam." What were their successes? Failures? Frustrations? Favorite aspects? Biggest dislikes? 2. Discuss the role of the other teams. Why did teams behave as they did? (Examples: Personality? Lack of information? Accurate portrayal of a country's character?) How would the real world have reacted to their proposals? How many of the frustrating characteristics of other teams were realistic? In what situations did teams play out of character? How did this affect the simulation? 3. How closely did the simulation reflect reality? In what respects did it mirror reality? In what respects did it fail to capture reality? 4. What were the foreign policy goals of your country? Did your goals change during the negotiations? 5. What particular negotiation skills or strategies did your team use to try to achieve its goals? How effective do you think that they were? What are some real world examples of these kinds of strategies (both from international relations and from your personal experience)? 6. What types of negotiation strategies did other teams use? Which negotiations were effective? On what issues were teams willing to compromise? On what issues were countries unwilling to compromise? 7. Who were your allies during the simulation? How did your country relate to your real world allies? Did other countries work with their real world allies? 8. How would the citizens of your country have reacted to your goals, your decisions, and your proposals? How do the citizens of a nation affect foreign policy? 9. How did time constraints affect the negotiations? Are there some issues on which the group might have achieved agreement if there had been more time in the simulation? On these issues, what questions remained to be addressed? 10. Discuss the role of the computer in the simulation. How did it hamper and/or facilitate negotiations? 11. How did your team work as a group? Was there conflict in the decision making process? How does this compare with real world decision-makers? 12. Discuss the flow of information. Was it difficult keeping up with the discussions? How did the students discern important messages from less important communications? Were certain communications automatically given priority or ignored? How does this compare with the flow of information in the real world?