UW Moot Court Honor Board Presents the Annual 1L Contract Drafting & Negotiation Competition
February 21-25, 2009

About the Competition

The UW Moot Court Honor Board is pleased to host its annual 1L Contract Drafting & Negotiation Competition here at the Law School in late February. The competition provides a fun and engaging atmosphere in which to role-play as attorneys and test your negotiating and contract drafting skills. In the preliminary round, you and a teammate will negotiate and draft a contract based on a pre-made scenario. After that round, the best oral negotiators will advance, tackling different scenarios in a negotiation-only (no written contract required) format.

No specialized knowledge of negotiating or contract drafting is required, and there will be training sessions hosted by professors to help you improve your skills in advance of the competition. Although competitors should learn effective negotiation and contract drafting techniques, research into the problems presented is not encouraged or necessary.

Benefits from Participation

The competition is fun . . . . very fun. You get to take a break from law school readings and negotiate with your fellow students using problems that are very creative. Together with another team, you do have to draft a written contract, but with an 8-page limit. The requirements are manageable with your school work – in fact, some 1L contract professors will be encouraging their students to participate. You might hate contracts but learn that you love negotiating, or vice versa. Sign up and try it out! In addition, those who participate and/or advance in the competition will earn points you can use when applying to become members of the UW Moot Court Honor Board for the purposes of Cumulative Selection invitations to the MCHB. Or you can care less about Moot Court Honor Board and simply have fun.

Competition Schedule and Important Dates

Signup Begins: Monday, 1/26/2009.
Signup Ends: Thursday, 2/5/2009 at 5pm, or when the number of teams reaches 60.
Rules, Problem, and Confidential Material Distributed: Monday, 2/9/2009.
Deadline for Dropping Out without Penalty: Friday, 2/13/2009 at 2pm.
First Round of Competition: Saturday, 2/21/2009 (at 9am or 1pm).
Advanced Negotiation Rounds: Monday-Wednesday, 2/23-2/25/2009 (at 6:15pm or 8pm).
Deadline for Turning in Written Contract: Monday, 3/2/2009 at 8am.

Moot Court Honor Board (MCHB) Competition Committee

Tim DeFors, Competition Chair,
Chris Kuyper, Logistics Manager,
Alex Waner, Judges Manager,
Todd Williams, Judges Manager,

Please email all questions to Tim DeFors at .

Preparation for Negotiation and Contract Drafting

We are scheduling lunchtime training sessions to prepare you for the competition. At least one member of each team should attend each training in order to gain valuable insight into the proper conduct of a negotiation and how to draft a coherent contract. These sessions will take place in the two weeks prior to the competition.

Signing Up and Space Limitations

The sign-up period will begin on Monday, January 26th and end promptly on Thursday, February 5 at 5:00pm, or when the number of teams reaches 60. Sign-up sheets will be posted outside the MCHB office on the first floor (Room 129). When signing-up, please include a check payable to the Moot Court Honor Board. The sign-up fee will be $50 per team. Please put the check in the MCHB mailbox in the general mailroom or deliver it to the MCHB office (please knock).

Competitor Package

On Monday, February 9th, the competition committee will distribute a package to each team that will include the Rules, the Problem and Confidential Information that each team is not to copy, distribute, or share. The creators of the Problem requested that it not be distributed electronically, so the package will be distributed in hard copy from a table in the main hallway over the lunch period. One member of each team will need to pick up the package then, or arrange a better time. On Friday, February 13th, teams will be notified by e-mail whether they were assigned to the morning or afternoon flight of the Saturday rounds. Pairings for the Saturday rounds will be posted and sent out via email on Wednesday, February 18th.

Format

First Round
The first round on Saturday will involve your two-person team negotiating with another team and completing a written contract based on the problem distributed on Feb. 9. The contract is to be negotiated in two one-hour sessions with a 30-minute break on Saturday, Feb 21. Following this negotiation, which will be judged by licensed attorneys, the opposing teams must together produce a single written contract that reflects the outcome of your negotiations, with a maximum of 8 pages. This written contract must be turned in to the MCHB mailbox in the general mailroom by Monday, March 2 at 8am. This contract will be graded by members of the Moot Court Honor Board. More specifics on the format of the contract will be distributed with the problem.

Later Rounds
The best oral negotiators from Saturday will advance to the next round on Monday night to test their skills against other teams using new, simpler negotiating problems. These problems will focus more on oral negotiation skills based on secret information that each side is given. The winners from each round will advance, with the final rounds to be held on Wednesday night. At the end of the entire competition, there will be awards for Best Negotiators, Best Written Contracts, and Best Oral and Written Combined Score. The problems for these later nights will be distributed the evening before each round.

On Reserve

When we distribute the problem we will also put sample contracts on reserve in the UW Law Library. We will also place “Getting to Yes,” a book on negotiating, on reserve. In addition, the library has many excellent resources on negotiation strategy and tactics and how to draft a contract.

Tools for Drafting Contracts -- UW Law Library
http://lib.law.washington.edu/ref/drafting.html

Drop Out Deadline

We are expecting significant turnout for this competition, and it is difficult to recruit an accurate number of judges. As a result, any team dropping out without good cause after 2/13/2009 will be barred from participating in future moot court events for one year, in accordance with Moot Court bylaws.