UM Space Law Team Prepares For World Championship

Since winning the North American championship in April, the moot court team at the University of Mississippi School of Law has been busy preparing for its next challenge: the World Championship.
The team’s win at the Manfred Lachs Space Law Moot Court Competition at Georgetown University Law Center earned it the right to compete in the international finals this month in Adelaide, Australia. The team began preparing immediately, but with two members graduating in May and everyone going different directions for summer break, they had to find ways to continue practicing remotely.
The Ole Miss team consists of third-year students Kent Aldenderfer of Huntsville, Alabama, and Kyle Hansen of Issaquah, Washington, and recent graduate Alexia Boggs (JD 2017), from Nashville, Tennessee. Andrea Harrington, the school’s air and space law instructor, serves as faculty adviser, and recent graduate Marshall McKellar (JD 2017), of Hattiesburg, is the team’s assistant coach.
“Over the summer, it was difficult to get many practices in, but we did fit in a few practices on Google Hangout because everyone was pretty much in a different city,” Harrington said. “But once we got back from the break, we had a couple of practices on campus with Kent and Kyle and a couple of online practices with Alexia.
“We also scheduled the week of Labor Day for Alexia and Marshall to come back, and we had an intensive week of practices.”
During the week the team was all back in Oxford, it conducted two practices a day most days. Several professors came to judge the team and give members a variety of perspectives. After the week concluded, the team will have a few more online practices before leaving for Australia.
Although the moot court problem is the same from the North American championships, this round features unknown factors for the team.
“The way this competition is different from a lot of moot courts is you have to prepare both sides of the argument, so you have to prepare a brief for both sides and oral argument for both sides, which is why there are three on the team,” Boggs explained. “Once we’re there, it’s a flip of the coin as to which side we will argue each round.”
The preparations were greatly enhanced by help of several faculty and staff members as well as the dedication of McKellar, who was a member of the 2016 team, Harrington said.
The team is scheduled to arrive in Australia on Sept. 22 and 23 and begin in-person practices once they are all there. The semifinal round of the competition is Sept. 26, and the final round is Sept. 28.
The team will be vying for the university’s second world championship in the competition. An Ole Miss team won the 2015 Manfred Lachs Space Law Moot Court Competition in Jerusalem, beating teams from India and Greece.
By Jordan Thomas