Our school offers many opportunities for students to engage in activities and groups that they enjoy.
With over 30 clubs and the ability to start new ones if interested, students are able to connect with others and do something they might not be able to participate in outside of school.
Mock Trial is a challenging extracurricular that applies knowledge of the law to a specified case. It allows members to learn how real cases work on trial, and gives them the skills required if pursuing a career in this field.
Each Mock Trial season is divided into several competitions with the regular season containing five weeks of local competitions. After these the top four teams compete at the county championships and the winner of that will compete at the regional championships. They must win regionals to be eligible for the state championship.
The advisor of Mock Trial is Mr. Anderson, and he has been the coordinator of the club for 15 years.
According to Mr. Anderson, our school’s team normally has about 15-20 members. He explains, “a minimum of six students is needed to conduct a trial: three attorneys and three witnesses. Ideally, the team involves over twelve members so that there are separate ‘teams’ for each side of the case.”
Each season there is a new case created that remains for the entirety of the school year. This year the case is about a business owner who is accused of committing arson to their business in order to collect a large insurance payout.
Mr. Anderson describes, “cases are created by the NYS Bar Association. The case remains the same for the entire calendar year. Often, they are modeled on real-life cases.” He includes that they’ve, “had cases modeled on the Bernie Madoff Financial Fraud trial or one based on a child actor suing their parents. Others are based on common trials [such as] last year’s [that] involved a civil case revolving around insurance fraud.”
Additionally, their competitions are pretty formal with Mr. Anderson describing that their “regular season trials are held at the Federal Building on Broad Street in Utica. Judges each week tend to be local attorneys. However, the playoff rounds sometimes move to other courtrooms. Often the semi-finals are held at the Utica City Court, while the county finals often are held before US District Judge David Hurd in the US District Court in Utica.”
As previously mentioned there are two positions within the trial: witnesses and attorneys. These roles have crucial jobs in order to win the case. Vijay Bapana, a senior and member, states, “[the] witness is responsible for memorizing their affidavit. An affidavit is a witness’ under-oath written testimony that describes their relation to this particular case. The responsibilities of an attorney are a bit different. Attorneys are responsible for conducting direct examination of their witnesses as well as conducting cross examination of the opponent’s witnesses.”
Mock Trial requires lots of outside work. Members must know how to navigate their way through questioning and answering in order to win the case.
Eoin Clive, who is also a member, explains, “we spend time each week making and adjusting our questions to help us catch the opposing side off guard. In the beginning of the season we just went through the case and learned the in’s and outs of it, and figured out what helped us and hurt us.”
This is crucial because without being able to defend an argument or explain a statement your work may be null and void. This isn’t just because it will not help you win, but it is also your job. Vijay describes, “witnesses have to learn their affidavits and know how to answer the questions that are going to be asked during direct examination.”
Mock Trial contains a lot of outside work in order to be successful in the case. Meetings are held often and require full attention to detail.
The club also doesn’t have any officer positions like most others offered by our school. Members are assigned their position and they all work together. It is not up to a group of select members to do all of the work and organize their meetings.
Many benefits come out of participating in Mock Trial. Public speaking is stressed greatly and encourages the members to talk in the public setting. It also influences them to learn how the law works and teach them components of the judicial system. Mr. Anderson explains that, “each role involves employing effective communication before the court.”
Overall, Mock Trial is a competitive and engaging club that requires hard work and knowledge of the law. It will greatly influence your speaking and writing skills, as well as educating you on how court cases run.
