ROCK HILL, SOUTH CAROLINA – Bishop England High School in Charleston, South Carolina, won top honors March 26 at the 45th annual Model United Nations conference at Winthrop University.
Held March 24-26, the program involved dozens of high school students remotely representing nine high schools across the Carolinas. An awards ceremony capped two days of deliberations over world events and this year’s theme, “Confronting a Year of Crisis.”
The overall award – the Winthrop Cup – went to Bishop England High students who represented the country of Poland.
The Geoffrey Bruce Award for the delegation acting most in character of its country went to Hilton Head Island High School, representing the country of the Dominican Republic.
Winthrop students debated in person in a masked, socially distanced way, while the delegates from the high schools participated online as they represented dozens of countries from around the world. Various high school delegations were recognized for writing outstanding resolutions for different committees.
Winthrop students recognized as outstanding advisors to their high school delegations were: Stephanie Martinez, Best Chair; Soli Byrd and Ellery McNeill, for their work with the Secretariat; and Henry Waldrep (U.S.A.), Giselle Mesa (Netherlands), Sabrina Angola (Venezuela) and Jasmin Peguero (North Korea), for their distinguished college delegate work.
This year’s Secretariat operated under the student leadership of Lauren Hill, secretary general; Austin Spencer, director general; and Kennedy Mayers, coordinator general. The three organized the conference, contacted the high schools and fellow college students and worked on logistics. Their advisor is Professor Chris Van Aller of the Department of Political Science.
For more information, contact Judy Longshaw, news and media services manager, at 803/323-2404 or longshawj@winthrop.edu.
