Mateus de Veiga Bilhar, a foreign student of International Relations Program from the Nankai University- University of Glasgow Joint Graduate School , was awarded both the "Outstanding Master's Thesis of Nankai University 2021" and the "Outstanding Thesis of the University of Glasgow" for his master's thesis on the fungibility of China’s economic order in Southeast Asia: an assessment of the strategic alliance between Cambodia and the Philippines. This is the first time that a graduate student from a joint program between two universities has been awarded this prize .

The International Relations Program is one of the graduate programs in English jointly developed by Nankai University and the University of Glasgow, combining the strengths of both universities. Since its launch in 2015, nearly 90 postgraduates have successfully graduated from the program and obtained their master's degrees from Nankai University and the University of Glasgow respectively. From 2018, the International Relations Program has expanded its intake and started to recruit international students from overseas. Mateus de Veiga Bilhar from Brazil, is the second batch of international students enrolled in the program after the expansion.