Stuyvesant’s Moot Court Team is Top Team in Manhattan

To end a stressful but fulfilling season, Stuyvesant’s Moot Court team competed at Fordham Law School on November 17. They advanced to the semifinals and earned the distinction of being the top-ranked school team in Manhattan. This result marked the second consecutive year the team reached the semifinal round, displaying the program’s growing consistency. 

Moot Court is a competitive activity in which students simulate Supreme Court cases. Participants analyze constitutional questions, prepare written arguments, and present them to a panel of judges, frequently law students or practicing attorneys, who interrupt them with rapid fire questions. At Stuyvesant, the team meets every Tuesday and Thursday during the Fall Semester with the help of coach Lisa Shuman, focusing on skills covering public speaking, case analysis, and critical thinking. This year, the Moot Court team argued cases involving the Fourth and Fifth Amendments, examining issues of search and seizure and Miranda rights in a school setting. 

Leading up to competitions, the team spent extensive time preparing and reviewing their cases. Freshman and team member Isaac Yeung described this process as demanding but rewarding. “We focused a lot on recreating the environment of the competition and replicating the questions that judges may ask,” Yeung said in an email interview. 

Senior and team member Tristan Haugh described his preparation process, stressing the importance of self-studying and individual preparation. “I usually work in a Google Doc and have pages of references,” Haugh said. “It’s a lot of preparation, but it’s individual, for the most part.”

In addition to internal preparation, the team benefited from outside mentorship. Junior and Deputy Captain Mufei Yu highlighted the guidance provided by a mentor lawyer working at Cravath, Swaine & Moore, Scott Cohen, who met with the team virtually. “Scott is our mentor lawyer, and he’s super helpful,” Yu said. “He zooms with us. He gives us critiques and feedback.” Yu also noted that former captain Emily Lok, now studying at Columbia University, returned to help the team refine their arguments before the semifinal round. 

Despite strong preparation, the team also faced challenges in the lead-up to competition day over the decision of selecting speakers. With only four speaking roles available, it was difficult to decide who would compete. Junior and team member Michaela Madanire described the process. “We want whoever is more prepared to be the speaker, and we took some risks letting Mufei go in place of [Senior Captain] Myles,” Madanire said. 

Another issue was the distribution of speaking roles. When Haugh mentioned that the team prioritized seniors as speakers in the competition, he brought up his concern over the rest of the Moot Court team. “We were trying to train the people who are speaking, which is important, but we took no time to train the people who weren’t speaking,” Haugh said. Without training, members that weren’t involved in giving speeches lacked the ability to practice their own skills. As a result, there might not be anyone prepared to lead the team once the captains graduate, which can potentially have long-term effects.

Nevertheless, team members expressed happiness and pride at their outcome. Myles Vuong highlighted the impressive performance of the junior members of the team, especially given their limited experience beforehand. “Adrien [Devery-Michelson] and Mufei especially were essential to our success,” Vuong said. “I felt really proud when Mufei spoke and responded to the judges’ questions gracefully, since we worked on her presentation earlier in the year.”

Many team members also recalled their surprise at their victory. Senior and team member Ellis Thompson recalled when the members believed they had been eliminated in quarterfinals. “Ms. Shuman went around asking if all of us were available the day of the semifinals; nobody knew what was happening. Then she said, ‘Great, ‘cause we advanced,’ and everyone was really happy,” Thompson said. 

Yeung also shared similar viewpoints of his shock at the team’s results. “We were worried we weren’t going to progress, but it felt great when we advanced and, specifically, when we found out that we made it to quarterfinals and got a BYE for the wildcard due to our performance in the [first] round. It was a very joyous moment.” Due to the team’s strong match for the first round, they automatically advanced past the wildcard, which is a play-in round used to determine the last spots in the next stage of the competition. 

The team’s experience at the Fordham competition offered several takeaways for their performance for future tournaments. One key revelation was the importance of spending more time becoming familiar with the details of each case. “As we advanced, the judges asked a lot of curveballs; they asked what happened in this precedent case, and sometimes it’s just a matter of if you know those facts or not,” Madanire said.

Haugh shared a similar perspective, emphasizing that a clear understanding of the case is essential for strong performance.“If you’re doing this for the sake of good legal work, you want to be reading the cases,” Haugh said. “A lot of people just echo points, and then they fall apart when you go deep into their argument and what the actual framework of it is.”

 Yu highlighted the necessity of a more rigid schedule and better time management in order to avoid cramming right before the competition. “I hope, moving forward, we can lock in on a better schedule. We don’t want to be worried about performance the night before the competition begins,” Yu said.

When concerning improvement for the future, Vuong hopes to avoid this problem by starting team preparations earlier, particularly by helping speakers and alternates strengthen their arguments and defenses. “Hopefully, next year’s team leaders can get a head start by assembling a team earlier and making sure our speakers and alternate competitors are ready for any questions,” Vuong said. “Being able to solidify our prepared arguments earlier means that each speaker could practice them a lot more.”

After a successful season, the team looks forward to what the next year holds for them. The members are hopeful that they can place even higher in future competitions. “I think [placing as semifinalists] means that we can step up next year,” Madanire said. “I know we were disappointed this year because we didn’t make it, but there’s definitely a chance of that next year if we just work as hard as we did this year.”