The Normal Community West High School mock trial team will compete this weekend at nationals.
It marks the first time a Unit 5 mock trial team is competing at the National High School Mock Trial Championship [NHSMTC]. It earned a chance to compete in Des Moines, Iowa after winning a state tournament in March.
The tournament generally includes more than 40 teams, including many state champion teams and teams from Guam, South Korea and the Northern Mariana Islands in the Pacific Ocean.
No Illinois team has ever won, though a team from Hinsdale, a west Chicago suburb, earned a runner-up placing in 2010.
This year, there are 48 teams competing. While the inaugural event also was held in Des Moines, the NHSMTC is hosted in different states and locations each year.
Mock trial format
A mock trial team performs a fake legal case, either on the plaintiff or defense side, and goes through each part of a trial. The Illinois State Bar Association releases the details of one case in the fall for each statewide mock trial team to try over the course of the year.
Teams compete in smaller events beginning in December, and each team tries the same case at the state tournament that was held in March in Springfield.
“We analyze the case, go in depth, reading every single detail, every single affidavit, stipulations, all the exhibits, and we implement each aspect of every part of the case,” said West senior Katherine Masters.
After students analyze the case, they each receive assigned parts.
“For me, I was a crossing attorney, so I used their affidavits against themselves and brought out bad facts, and that I would cross them on that aspect,” said Masters.
Preparing for nationals
When the NCWHS team won state and earned a spot at nationals, the students soon received the details of a new case that all teams will try in Iowa.
“It's been really challenging,” said coach John Bierbaum. “When it's a [regular season] mock trial competition, we go and we travel up to the Chicago suburbs and take on really great teams, and now you're trying to simulate a several month season in a couple weeks."
Official events are Thursday through Saturday. Scrimmage events also are held, with the Normal West team facing Texas and California in that capacity.
“California is really exciting,” said senior Raya Radoslavova. “I know they were top five last year, so being able to go against them with, realistically actually no stakes is really exciting, because we can just learn everything we can.”
After scrimmage rounds, competition rounds will begin. Matchups will be made based on power rankings. Competition rounds last up to three hours, about twice as long as at the statewide level.
“We never expected to win state, so now it's just like, do the best we can at nationals to prove ourselves even further that we've put in the work to be amazing,” said Masters.
“I'm going in with no expectations, but I know we've worked so hard and we're all so committed and so determined,” said Radoslavova. “We have a very competitive spirit. We look at every experience as just a way to grow. And like, we don't put a lot of pressure on winning or performing, but the idea is just always to grow.”
Masters and Radoslavova both plan to attend the University of Illinois, with Masters studying psychology on the pre-law track and Radoslavova studying neuroscience.
