The Moot Court Honors Board is composed of students with demonstrated skills in oral advocacy.  California Western sponsors two types of teams: appellate advocacy and trial competition.  Appellate teams write a brief that discusses legal issues, then advocate their position to a panel of judges, taking questions from the bench. Trial teams prepare and conduct trials before judges and sometimes juries, doing direct and cross-examination of witnesses, and making motions and objections, and opening and closing arguments.   

Students have the opportunity to compete in moot court exercises early in their law school careers. In the first year Legal Skills program, students write and research their own appellate briefs and then argue one side of the brief in appellate argument through the Sophister program, which is administered by the MCHB. Second and third year students are eligible to compete in the Gafford Intramural Trial competition, which serves as a tryout for the MCHB Trial Team. The following are some of the other competitions that the law school has entered: 

• National Trial Competition
• San Diego Defense Lawyer's Competition
• Tournament of Champions
• Philip C. Jessup International Law Moot Court  Competition - 2005 Regional Champions!
• National Moot Court Competition
• Roger J. Traynor Moot Court Competition
• National Appellate Advocacy Competition
• Negotiation Competition Team

In addition, MCHB establishes and maintains files of materials, forms, briefs and points and authorities for the training of law students in the advocacy areas of law.

MCHB@law.cwsl.edu