Getting to and from an event can unfortunatly become a timely hassle, and because of this, the MAS has decided to create a transportation department whose core function is to make sure you and your chapter arrive and depart from your destination in a safe and time-efficient manner. Our excellent directors of logistics will be working around the clock arranging buses, trains, subways, cars, and planes to make sure everyone is comfortably taken care of.

MAS Director of Logistics, Hallie Mitnick, elaborates:

Dear JSAers,

The Logistics Department is responsible for two crucial elements of the JSA experience: transportation and convention logistics. This year, in regards to transportation, we are working on making travel simpler for both large and small chapters. The key to effective chapter transportation is thinking ahead, so please feel free to contact us as at any time with transportation questions so that we can help you to the best of our ability. Also, it is really important that you communicate with your advisor and school administration in a timely fashion, because it might take awhile to secure a bus.

If you’re just getting started with chapter logistics planning, you should first assess how many people will attend. From there (and with a little bit of our help), you can decide what would be the best way to travel. We are emphasizing public transportation as an easy and reasonable mode of transportation for small delegations and are ready and willing to aid chapter leaders with everything from scheduling to purchasing tickets. For large chapters, we can help you organize busing and, for Winter Congress, we will try to make the JSA-organized busing as efficient as possible.

The Logistics Department will also be working on convention logistics, which includes everything from luggage storage to transitions between debate blocks. We will make luggage collection and key distribution more efficient and to ensure that everything moves smoothly between debate blocks.

Specifically for Winter Congress, we’d like to emphasize public transportation as a very viable option for smaller chapters. Union Station is a hub for Amtrak, and chapters can easily take the Metro from Union Station to the Pentagon City station, which is right near the hotel. Our logistics plan is complete with information about public transportation and driving directions from all different directions, so please feel free to consult and contact us if you should need assistance!

Sincerely,
Hallie Mitnick, MAS Director of Logistics (bookgirl424@aol.com) and
Brett Levinson, MAS Asst. Director of Logistics (giantsfan919@aol.com)