Correction appended.
Ten members of Brown Mock Trial competed at the American Mock Trial Association National Championship Tournament April 16–18 in Memphis, Tenn., placing 11th in their division.
Rhodes College hosted this year's nationals, which featured the country's top 48 college mock trial teams out of approximately 650. The teams were separated into two divisions, and each team competed in four rounds, with the top team in each division competing for the national championship title. Brown has qualified for nationals in previous years, including last year and 2007.
The road to nationals for the 10 members of Team UV first began in Providence at the mock trial regionals. Team UV won first place with a record of 7-1, qualifying them for the first round of nationals, also called super-regionals, according to team captain Alysha Naik '11.
The Mock Trial Association also awarded several honors to individual team members. At nationals, Gaurie Tilak '11, a member of The Herald's editorial page board, won the All-American Witness Award. Rachel Shur '12 received an Outstanding Witness Award, while Naik and Andrew Nizamian '12 were both named Outstanding Attorneys at super-regionals. At regionals, Shur and Tilak received Outstanding Witness Awards, and Nizamian received an award for Outstanding Attorney.
Other team members are Jared Bellot '12, Bianca Figueroa-Santana '10.5, Jamison Kinnane '12, Katya Potkin '13, Stephen Rickli '13 and Jeffrey Wilke '13.
Another team from Brown placed second at Providence, qualifying them for super-regionals as well. At the Worcester Regionals, the third Brown team placed 10th, but did not qualify for the opening round of nationals, according to Naik.
At the super-regionals in Boston, Team UV placed in the top four and was the only Brown team to earn themselves a place in the national competition. In Memphis, Team UV faced off against teams from Duke, the University of Iowa, Dickinson College and St. Olaf College, Naik said.
In addition to receiving individual accolades, doing well at nationals also means that Brown gets invited to the best college tournaments, such as those at the University of California at Los Angeles, the University of Miami and Columbia, Naik said. "Competing against the best is what makes you better," she said.
Unlike many other teams at nationals, Brown is student-run and does not have a professional coach. "What defines Brown mock trial is the dynamic of our organization as a whole," Naik said. "The fact that we're completely student-run … we're teaching ourselves the material, we're not getting any outside help from attorneys or anything. I think it's pretty commendable that we can do so well," she added.
Due to an editing error, a headline in Monday's Herald ("Mock Trial team wins 11th nationally," April 26) incorrectly implied that a Brown mock trial team was ranked 11th in the nation. In fact, the team placed 11th in its division, one of two at a national tournament. The Herald regrets the errors.
