Shuffling of competitive mooters leads to confusion
As in the past, the upper year competitive mooting tryouts attracted widespread participation, with 84 individuals trying out for 65 available positions. After three days of tryouts, individuals received their results on Friday, September 17, the same day that the Faculty’s accept/decline period for Toronto OCIs opened. But following a potentially stressful week, some students were moved in and out of competitive moots due to an administrative requirement.
Students participating in an upper-year competitive moot take the associated Moot course for credit. The course is based on a conditional enrol where students are manually added to the class following a successful moot tryout. Due to the subject matter of some moots, a student must have taken or be currently enrolled in a co- or prerequisite class to participate. For example, administrative law is a co- or prerequisite class for the Laskin moot.
On September 17, the Moot Court Committee (MCC) informed students of their selected moot, based on the individuals’ performances during the tryouts and how they ranked their moot preferences. Often, this is the conclusion of the tryout period and the results are finalized. However, some students were shuffled between moots because they lacked the necessary co- or prerequisite course to participate, even if they were on the waitlist for that class.
As a result of the changes, at least one of the moots lacked enough individuals to compete. Students who were already enrolled in the prerequisite class were subsequently invited to tryout for the moot, despite moot tryouts being officially over.
Given the passing of the add/drop deadline for first term and full year courses on September 22, the moot results are now finalized with all spots filled. While the majority of students who were initially offered a competitive mooting position still secured a spot, the experience left many confused.
In a comment for Ultra Vires, Assistant Dean Sara Faherty responded: “The law school strictly adheres to pre- and co-requisites in all courses (not just the moots.)”
A student affected by the changes remarked that, “it was very confusing to receive multiple phone calls being offered different moots and switched back and forth … Each change also created a chain reaction to everyone else that got bumped out of the moot that they were previously offered.”
The student noted that the strict co- and prerequisite requirements were not made clear when course selection began in the summer, a time when students could have ranked the required classes more highly. “We were told [during the administration’s summer Cognomos information session] not to worry about the lottery nature of Cognomos because problems can be fixed manually at the back end. In other words, there was no notice that the responsibility to fulfill the competitive moots’ pre-requisites/co-requisites entirely lies with us until the MCC’s information session, which was two months after course allocation started.”
It appears many students “thought that the Records Office would manually put you in the courses after tryouts — similar to the externships that require application.” It is unclear if these requirements were strictly enforced in previous years.
Another student, also affected by the changes, provided some constructive criticism for the moot tryout process, stating that, “the uncertainty of mooting makes it really unfortunate that it’s embedded within the course selection process. Students have to drop courses to take a moot prerequisite that they otherwise may not have taken, or they may have to rank a moot prerequisite higher than they otherwise would like to have.”
They offered that a better alternative might be to “keep X number of slots open in each moot’s prerequisite course, with X being the number of people in the given moot. If mooters need to get into the course they can, if there isn’t any need, then the waitlist can just be advanced by that many spaces.”
Multiple students affected by the changes commented that they commend the MCC for doing their best under the circumstances and trying to keep everyone informed as they resolved the situation.
At this time, the MCC declines to comment on the matter.
