Issue 3 Issue 3 | Page 4

A 3 inch thick binder of court case briefs, letters, and articles. That’s about 400 of pages of information to pore over in order to fully understand everything there is to know about Gavin Grimm v. Gloucester County Board, a Supreme Court case that deals with transgender rights. Bhargavi Bhatt ‘17, Denise Medina ‘17, Kimberly Lam ‘19, and Abigail Kufeldt ‘19 had to do that in order to argue their case at Silicon Valley Urban Debate League’s Moot Court (SVUDL) on May 1st. Moot Court is essentially SVUDL putting forth their best debaters to showcase the skills they’ve learned over the past year in front of lawyers and judges from the Bay Area.

“It’s not about winning for this one-this event is just about the speeches and presenting the case in front of the court as you would in a courtroom. It’s just to display to lawyers and other people how hard they’ve worked in SVUDL,” said Mariam Ahmed, alumni intern at SVUDL.

Medina, Bhatt, Kufeldt, and Lam met with the East Palo Alto team and their future mentors on March 4th, where they learned about the case. It was an intimidating experience for all of them, as they were just realizing how much work they would have to put in over the next two months in order to be prepared.

“I honestly didn’t think it would be as big of a time commitment as it was,” said Bhatt. “I remember when I first met Chris [Hersey] and Willie [Hernandez], who were some of the lawyers who were helping us, they stated the case, they told us what it was about, and I just fell in love with it.”

After working to understand the complexities of the case and the laws that were involved in it, the team began writing speeches, practicing delivery, and then learning how to field questions from the judges.

“With Moot Court, it’s really different because now you’re not just talking to two people from the other team and a judge, you’re talking to 3 federal judges and 100 people in the audience, so it’s a lot more intense,” said Lam.

As the event began, Hernandez took the time to stress the importance of changing the face of law. He spoke about how HPE’s partnership with SVUDL was in both of their best interests, as SVUDL works to reach out to people who aren’t represented in law, mainly low-income students, students of color, and first generation students, who might express an interest in law but not have the resources or knowledge of how to pursue it.

As Medina, the first speaker, stood at the podium, all she felt was nerves.

“I told one of the judges beforehand, ‘Yeah, I’m really nervous, so if you see me turning pale, I’m gonna throw up’ and then he was just like ‘It’s okay, I’m nervous too’, and that really calmed me down, because a federal district court judge is nervous, so it’s fine if I’m too,” said Medina.

Medina, Bhatt, and Lam took their turns at the podium, fielding tricky questions from the judges while standing their ground on their position. Both teams had prepared for the questions that the judges might bring up, but as Santiago Pacheco, from East Palo Alto Phoenix Academy, of the EPA team said, “They [the judges] made them [the questions] harder, like they kicked them up a notch. So although I was prepared for some of it, a lot of it I had to think of on my feet because of how they shaped the questions and how they made them more difficult.”

Pacheco’s responses to questions that were intended to trip him up caught the attention of many, including Paul Grewal, one of the guest speakers from Facebook. Grewal was blown away by how the students were able to improvise so quickly, Pacheco in particular.

“At one point, the judges asked why we shouldn’t take into consideration the discomfort of all the other students beside the person bringing this lawsuit, and instead of stuttering or stammering, he took the judges and the entire room all the way back to Jim Crow. To frame the issue in those terms on his feet within two minutes and leave the judges speechless was a pretty hard thing to pull off,” said Grewal.

As the Moot Court wrapped up, all three judges stated that the students were much more polished and prepared than many lawyers they’d seen in court in the past.

This Moot Court only solidified the participants’ interest in law. Bhatt, who had been torn between computer science and law, said that the aftermath of the Moot Court made her realize that all her hard work had been worth it.

“In that moment, I felt it. I wanted to be a lawyer. I wanted another case, I wanted to do the entire process again, because I just felt so powerful,” Bhatt said.

Get Your Lawyer On

By Sanya Kamidi

From left to right, Cindy Koo, Bhargavi Bhatt '17, Denise Medina '17, Kimberly Lam '19, Abigail Kufeldt '19, and Christopher Hersey.

Photos courtesy of www.whatseatingcheff.com

The team looks over their notes one last time before the Moot Court begins.

The Silver Creek students speak to one of the judges and their mentor before the event begins.

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