The beginning of 2024 marked the start of a new season for the Poly Moot Court Team. During weekly practices, the team explores constitutional law, debates the First Amendment and practices public speaking.

Senior and team member Maddie Hays remarked, “It gives you a really unique opportunity to meet a lot of different people, because Moot draws a lot of people from diverse parts of the Poly community. I’ve made so many incredible friends through Moot that I would’ve never talked to otherwise, especially people in other grades. I just always have a really good time with them.”

During their first tournament of the year, Poly took eight teams to Duke University and most of the teams made it to the second-day elimination rounds. The team of sophomores, Amelie Salette and Allison Zhang, and the team of junior Charlotte McDonald and Hays, both competed in the semi-finals. The following weekend, the team ventured to the University of Chicago, where team captains and seniors Audrey Tomlin and James Miller won first while the team of McDonald and Hays advanced to semi-finals.

After the tournament in Chicago, the team reached a second-place national ranking with a score of 1295 points. The team continued to grow and sent teams to a virtual international tournament hosted by the University of Toronto, where, despite steep competition, sophomores Ginny Cheung and Langston Standridge advanced to quarterfinals.

The team now prepares for the last regional tournament of the season at Yale University. Four of the teams, which include sophomores Zhang, Salette and Filiz Fish; juniors Simon Zernicki-Glover and McDonald; and seniors Miller, Tomlin and Hays, won bids to Nationals as well, which they will attend at the end of April.

Miller said, “Moot is tons of fun, even if you’re not interested in the law. Read the case, go to one tournament and see if it’s fun, because it’s one of those things worth trying.”