Coastal Carolina University students who attended the 20th Southern Regional Model United Nations (SRMUN) held recently in Atlanta won the Top 10% Award, given for the delegates’ outstanding position papers, and set a record for conference awards.

Jonathan Young, a senior politics major from Myrtle Beach, won the outstanding delegate award for his performance in the Security Council. Caitlin Spahr, a sophomore political science major from Fort Stewart, Ga., won the outstanding delegate award for her performance in the Commission on the Status of Women.

Matt Cleary and Krisztina Szabo won a mock International Court of Justice case brought against China by the International Telecommunications Union contesting the legality of Chinese content filtering practices of the internet.

Eleven students from the Coastal Carolina University delegation represented China: head delegate Cleary, delegates Tom Ducary, Gregory Dukes, Cameron Hayes, Jessica Kata, Sydney Lauren, Heidi Ludwig, Caitlin Spahr, Krisztina Szabo, David Ward and Jonathan Young. The students were accompanied by political science professors Ken Rogers and Min Ye.

The 20th SRMUN included 700 delegates representing 91 countries from 43 colleges and universities across the southeastern United States and along the Atlantic coast. This was the largest gathering of delegates in the conference’s history, and participants were from numerous universities including the University of Alabama, Clemson University, the University of Florida and others. The delegates addressed several important issues at the conference such as human rights, refugees, educating youth, terrorism, the dangers of landmines, climate change, human cloning and democratization of the UN.