The Chanticleer Intelligence Brief would like to congratulate two of its longtime members, Margaret “Megan” Shoop and Brianna Edwards, for going above and beyond in the 2022-2023 academic year. Megan (pictured above) served as an analyst in the CIB’s Asia Desk from August of 2020 until her graduation this semester. She received the Regional Expert Award for the Asia Desk in the spring of 2021 and the spring of 2023. In the past semester, Megan researched the bilateral relations between China and Taiwan.

Megan graduated earlier this month with three degrees, a B.S. in Marine Science, a B.A. in Political Science, and a B.A. in Languages and Intercultural Studies. She also completed minors in Applied Mathematics and in Asian Studies. In addition to her numerous academic accolades, Megan was named CCU’s Outstanding Student of the Year for two different colleges, the Edwards College of Humanities and Fine Arts, and the Spadoni College of Education and Social Sciences. Moreover, she was named Outstanding Student of the Year for all of Coastal Carolina University.

The CIB also wishes to congratulate Brianna Edwards, who joined the CIB in January of 2022, and most recently served as an analyst in the organization’s Asia Desk, alongside Megan. Brianna is majoring in Intelligence and Security Studies and minoring in Chinese. On May 11, CCU announced that Brianna is among eight CCU students who have been awarded the Ministry of Education Huayu Enrichment Scholarship, which provides funding for them to travel to Taiwan to study Mandarin. Prior to winning this scholarship, Brianna took Chinese courses with Xinyi Tan, Ph.D., associate professor of Chinese and French in CCU’s Department of Languages and Intercultural Studies.

The CIB is proud of the achievements of its analysts and wishes them the very best in pursuing their goals in the coming academic year.