USC Law students Tess Marie Tan and Mark Lawrence Badayos show their trophy and other awards as Southeast Asia champion of the Stetson International Environmental Moot Court Competition. (CONTRIBUTED)
The University of San Carlos (USC) Law Mooting Team was the grand champion of the Southeast Asian Regional Rounds of the Stetson International Environmental Moot Court Competition, besting 18 law schools from other Asean countries.
This is the first time a Cebu university bagged the top prize in the SEARR-Stetson IEMCC. The University of Cebu Law won 3rd place last year.
With the win, USC Law will be representing the Philippines for the first time in the finals of the Stetson moot court competition in Gulfport, Florida this April 13-16.
Moot court competitions allow law students to engage in simulated court proceedings, which usually involve drafting memorials and propaganda, and participating in oral arguments.
The focus of this year’s international competition is the cultural property and the protection of elephants especially with the growing illegal ivory industry.
The USC Law team, composed of USC law students Tess Marie Tan and Mark Lawrence Badayos competed last January 14-16 at the University of the Philippines – Diliman.
“Preparation started with seeing the end in mind. Being the first team USC-Law has ever sent to Stetson, Mark and I always knew we would make history. We funneled all our effort into ensuring it was a good one,” said 25-year-old Tan.
Tan won Overall best Oralist in the entire competition, while 22-year-old Badayos won 4th best Oralist. The USC law team also won Overall Best Memorial.
The Southeast Asian leg of the Stetson competition had four rounds of preliminaries to get the top eight teams, quarterfinals to eliminate four more teams, and in the championship round to produce the top two.
According to Tan, USC was always the top team throughout the competition with a win-loss record of 7-0.
“I think what really made us win was that we have the best coach and the best support system. Mark and I went to every round as representatives of the collective hopes and prayers of USC Law and our loved ones,” she said.
“The entire experience, since we started preparing the memorial to practices for the oral round to actual rounds to the Grand Finals stage and finally claiming the title for USC Law, was very humbling,” said Badayos, Tan’s partner.
Regional qualifiers University of the Philippines Diliman, National University of Singapore and Singapore Management University will also be joining USC Law in the Stetson finals in Florida.
The 20th Stetson IEMCC is the world’s largest moot court competition devoted exclusively to global environmental issues.