Twelve teams battled for the American Bar Association Client Counseling Competition National Championship at the LSU Paul M. Hebert Law Center on Friday and Saturday, March 16-17, with St. Mary’s School of Law taking home the title. The San Antonio-based law school’s team now advances to the International Client Counseling Competition, which will be held in late April in Poland. Baylor University School of Law and Seattle University School of Law placed as finalists.
Hosting the tournament required dozens of volunteers to coordinate and judge competitions. In the preliminary rounds of competition alone, 12 counseling sessions took place concurrently in the Law Center, with more than 50 judges observing student teams in person and virtually. LSU Law Professors Darlene Goring, Aimee Self Pittman, Kathy Simino, and Robert Lancaster all served as volunteer judges, as did Advocacy Fellow Olivia Maynard and several LSU Law alumni.
Many LSU Law students also gained valuable experience serving as volunteer clients in the counseling sessions, including Allison Adger, Rayni Amato, Avery Bragg, Brenden Carroll, Kaysee Craighead, Courtney Fowler, Miriam Grant, Caroline Hardy, Summer Knight, Catherine Lant, Rini Mannankara, Diamond McCray, Anna Mester, and Mary Thomas. Board of Advocates members Zach Smith, Dustin Morganti, and Miriam Grant were instrumental in organizing and administering of the tournament.
“Multiple long-time competition coaches told me that our students were the best clients they had ever seen at any instance of this tournament,” said LSU Law Director of Field Placements & Moot Court/Trial Advocacy Program Jeff Brooks, who also serves as chair of the ABA Client Counseling Competition Subcommittee.
This year marked the 50th anniversary of the American Bar Association Client Counseling Competition National Championship, which annually tests law students on one of the fundamental lawyering skills: interviewing and counseling a client. This year’s competition involved nearly 100 teams from 52 law schools nationwide.
