The conference was co-hosted by Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) and the American Center for International Policy Studies (AMCIPS) in Washington, DC. One hundred and 80 students represented 40 countries on three committees.

Boston College won the award, which is given to the top five delegations, despite the handicap of a relatively small delegation of four students and representation on only two of the three committees. Irvine and Johns debated UN reform and Iran's suspected nuclear weapons program on the Security Council while Joye and Powell covered nonproliferation and conventional weapons controls on the General Assembly's First Committee on Disarmament and International Security. In both committees, BC delegates proposed and managed to engineer the passage of resolutions in line with British policy.

The conference began on Thursday evening at the State Department with an address from Mark P. Lagon, deputy assistant secretary for International Organization Affairs, on the United States' role in the United Nations. On Friday morning, the four seniors attended a private briefing at the British Embassy by two political officers with specialties in UN issues and arms control.

"Talking to real practitioners of international relations gets you beyond the theories—they can relate how states actually pursue goals while interacting with one another," said Johns, who is an International Studies major, as is Irvine.

Powell, a joint philosophy-political science major who spent his junior year abroad at Oxford, said of the experience: "You learn so much about world affairs by putting yourselves in the position of another country."

Joye, a finance major, noted that Model UN is not just for International Studies majors or others in the College of Arts and Sciences. "Model United Nations has helped me to better understand the intense foreign policy debates we read about every day."

Irvine thanked Deese and the BC community for their support. "It was an honor for us to represent BC at this invitational event. We wish the best to next year's BC team. We encourage anyone interested in world affairs to get involved with Model UN."

Boston College Model United Nations will represent Belarus and Libya at the McGill Model United Nations Assembly in Montreal in January, and Israel and South Korea at the Harvard National Model United Nations conference in February.

For more on the BC Model United Nations, visit the group's Web site.