Online advocacy: Views from a Moot Coach

• Main Author: CHEN, Siyuan
• Format: text
• Language: English
• Published: Institutional Knowledge at Singapore Management University 2020
• Subjects: Moot competitions; Online platform; COVID-19; pandemic; Legal Education
• Online Access: https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/sol_research/3196; https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/context/sol_research/article/5154/viewcontent/SMU_SOL_Law_and_COVID_MootCoach_pv.pdf
• Institution: Singapore Management University

Taking part in an international moot court competition can be one of the most exciting things a law student can do. Months are spent bunkering down with team mates and coaches analysing, researching, producing written submissions on a wide range of issues that seldom have obvious answers; more months are spent refining the oral submissions before they are presented to the judges at the competition. Mooters never had to grapple with the prospect of presenting the arguments using an online platform. The most recent coronavirus changes that. In this piece, I identify some of the issues and drawbacks of making legal arguments online. Having things move online has not changed the fact that highly trained mooters continue to be prized by law firms.