Clark University senior Tara Lewis and junior Sarah A. Richard were both competitively selected to attend the SUNY-Oneonta Undergraduate Political Science Conference held in Oneonta, N.Y., on March 20. Each student presented an independent research paper, with Richard’s presentation winning top honors.

Lewis and Richard both major in government and international relations at Clark. Their papers were first drafted for Professor Srinivasan Sitaraman’s International Law of Human Rights capstone seminar course in spring 2009. Lewis presented her paper titled, “Amnesty and its Threat to International Human Rights Law.” Richard’s paper was “The Natasha Laws: Decriminalization of Prostitution and the Effects on Human Rights Abuses in Europe.”

The conference’s organizing committee described Richard’s presentation and preparation as highly impressive, and she was given the Best World Politics Paper award, along with a cash prize of $75.

The goal of the SUNY-Oneonta Political Science Conference is to create an environment in which highly motivated political science students from many institutions can network and share their questions, information and insights about various aspects of political science. The conference seeks to provide an opportunity for some of the best and brightest undergraduates to interact socially in an intellectually stimulating venue.

“Sarah and Tara’s papers are fine examples of how collaborative and cooperative work can emerge from intense classroom experience at Clark University,” Sitaraman said.