Danny O'Connor

First Mock Trial Tournament

     For the entire car ride up to Louisville I couldn’t fight away the nerves. I had joined mock trial at UC months ago; I had thought it would be a good group to join at the very beginning of the school year as a pre-law student, but now I was having serious regrets about my decision. I had been under constant stress from the work it entailed. While I had been given academic credit, I also had to give my Monday and Wednesday evenings from 6-8 P.M. each week. The amount of speaking and words I had been cramming into my head to deliver for our first tournament over those last several weeks leading up having driven me nearly crazy. Being a person that naturally has over-anxiety about pretty much everything certainly didn’t help either. So there I was, sitting in the car, trying to go over the primary cross examination I would have to perform in just a few hours if we were on the prosecution side first, as well as the nearly 3 and a half page (7-8 minute long) speech I would have to give on the prosecution side. What was worse is that in addition to my extreme nerves, I also knew that I had not put enough preparation into them. While doing them in the mirror, or practicing them by yourself in your dorm room is one thing, having thorough enough knowledge and confidence to execute them in front of not only another team, but also an entire panel of judges is quite a bit different. All of these thoughts further cluttered my head and broke what little focus I was trying to cling to. My other team mates and one coach that was in my car were carrying on a casual conversation, which was even further compromising my desperate attempt to do some last second studying. I had always hated long car rides, but at that time I was hoping the ride would take as long as possible. I was actually relieved when we ran into pretty heavy traffic on the highway right outside of Cincinnati. To make matters worse, halfway into the trip I made the embarrassing realization that I had forgotten a belt, which was obviously something that would be needed to go with the apparel of an attorney or any person attending a court hearing for that matter. I made the humiliating announcement (trying to play it as cool as possible of course), and my annoyed coach conceded his belt over to me while also mentioning to never do something that stupid again.

     We finally arrived to the court house in down town Louisville. At this point, everyone was incredibly flustered; the traffic we had run into early in the trip had caused us to be pretty late. We scrambled to get into our attire for competition and rushed over the opening ceremony. We selected the school that we were to face. I had my fingers crossed, praying that we would not go on prosecution. This plea for help was evidently answered because we went competed on the defense side the first night, where my role was significantly less and I was much more prepared. I took a sigh of relief, realizing that all that fretting in the car ride over had been for nothing. Our team as a whole did not do great on that first night of competition, but it was ultimately a much smoother transition for me competing in mock trial for the very first time. I had more time to study for my larger role in the hotel room that night.

     The rest of the weekend was not hugely successful, but was overall a positive experience for me. In the end, I received the highest attorney scores on my team from the judges despite the fact that I could have certainly been much more prepared. This gave me a great deal of confidence for my future endeavors in mock trial and made me realize that this was an activity that I could possibly be pretty good at if I was willing to apply myself more. I also took pride in the fact that this was the first time in my adult life that I had taken on a serious public speaking challenge, especially for the means of competing. Looking ahead, I knew that as a result of the weekend that had started out unbearably stressful, I had gained incredibly valuable experience.

Explanation of this significant event

     The significant event that I chose to present was the weekend of October 25-27 this past semester in which I competed in my first mock trial experience. I had tried out for mock trial the second week of school and had been attending practices since then. The tournament (and first time I competed) was at a courthouse in down town Louisville. There were a little over 20 other teams competing at the tournament, and some of those teams represented the very best mock trial programs in the nation. Needless to say, there was a slight amount of pressure.

     This event was significant for a number of reasons. While I had some public speaking experience in the past, this was the first time in college, and really in my life for that matter, in which I had to speak in a high pressure environment. I had always considered myself good at memorizing and absorbing information, but mock trial put that skill to the ultimate test. I not only gained valuable experience, but also learned a lot about myself over the course of that weekend. The competition helped me learn about how to better deal with high stress situations, and it especially helped me learn more about thinking on my feet. Of course, it also helped me get my feet a little wet and know what to expect at future mock trial competitions.

     For my medium, I chose to write a short story about the event. I do not consider myself a very artsy person, and as often as possibly, I try to stay away from visual representations. I enjoy writing just about anything, and I feel that I best express myself through written word. I would say that I know myself pretty well, so it is safe to say there are no emotions easier to capture than my own, and I most certainly remember exactly how I felt that weekend. Moving forward, I expect this experience to make me and all around better member of both the UC community as well as University Honors Program community, as well as make me an all-around better person.