Jodee Storm Sullivan (JD ’24) built a career out of something she once hoped to avoid: she had scant interest in being in a courtroom and no plans to try. These days, she’s a litigator who routinely returns to Chapman to coach moot court, the same program that changed her mind.

Her 1L year looked the way most first years do. It was full, fast and structured around learning how to read cases, write clearly and keep her head above water while drinking from the proverbial firehose. The idea of standing up and arguing in front of judges didn’t really factor into that version of law school, at least not for her.

That all changed at the end of her first year, when Golden Gavel, Chapman’s annual 1L moot court competition, rolled around. As part of their Legal Analysis Writing and Research class, Chapman Law first-years spend weeks preparing an appellate-style argument based on a case problem, presenting it in live rounds before judges. For Sullivan, it started the same way everything else had that year—as just another requirement. It was something to prepare for, complete and move on from. Then she got into it. After the first round, something felt different. Sullivan was more engaged than she expected. She found herself thinking about how her argument landed, replaying questions, wanting another chance to do it better. When she advanced through rounds of competition, it stopped feeling like an assignment and started to feel like something she wanted to excel at. Then she advanced again. And again. By the time she reached the finals of the contest, and in spite of her many plans for law school, Sullivan was becoming a litigator.

In spite of herself, Sullivan won Golden Gavel, and something shifted, even if she couldn’t fully name it yet. “I didn’t realize it at the time,” she says now, “but that moment changed my life forever.” Winning Golden Gavel led her to join Chapman’s Moot Court team, and once she stepped into that space, the courtroom became the axis her entire law school experience pivoted on.

While the work of student advocacy competition was demanding, what she remembers most fondly were the people. She readily recalls the teammates who pushed her, and each other, in practice, the coaches who gave direct, often hard-to-hear feedback, and the broader community that formed around the program.

“Through moot court, I made lifelong friends, forged incredible connections and had life-changing experiences,” Sullivan says. Those relationships extended beyond graduation in a very real way. One of her moot court coaches is now a partner at the firm where she works. What started as feedback during moot court competition practice rounds has turned into conversations about real cases and real courtroom strategy. The setting and the stakes might be different, but the process is very familiar. Sullivan describes it as feeling like she’s “back in the appellate courtroom on campus,” even though the stakes are considerably higher than the hypothetical “dry runs” of her student advocacy days.

Returning to Chapman to coach a moot court team felt like putting on an old shoe. Talking about her experience of Chapman now, she almost always ends up talking about the competition program, the people she has met through it, and the sense of connection that came with it all, she adds, “Basically, all my favorite memories from Chapman are thanks to moot court.”

Her coaches played a vital role in shaping this experience. Direct, consistent and deeply invested in her improvement, they pushed her to refine her arguments and think more critically about how she approached advocacy. Now, as a coach herself, this formative approach shows up in the structure of Sullivan’s own practice sessions and the way she works with her students. She encourages her teams to move through arguments in sections, revisiting the same points across multiple practice sessions, adjusting their phrasing, tightening structure and working through questions that force them to think with precision and clarity. By the end of the student advocacy contest season, the growth in her students is obvious. Students who once worked cautiously through each sentence are now standing tall before judges, engaging with questions comfortably and responding confidently, without any hesitation. The reward, for Sullivan, is when she can see students recognizing this change on their own, when they can see the difference between how they started and how they finished; “What’s best is when they realize for themselves how much they’ve grown,” she says.

Her approach to coaching centers on this gradual progression. Early practices focus on understanding the problem and identifying what matters. As the season continues, the focus shifts toward refinement, adaptability and confidence. She encourages students to develop their own style and “feel” for advocacy rather than trying to replicate someone else’s approach–teaching a vital lesson that authenticity makes for highly effective courtroom arguments.

Looking ahead, Sullivan doesn’t see moot court as something that belongs only to her time in law school–it is the bedrock of her life as a lawyer, and coaching is an extension of this.

“Moot court scratches an intellectual itch unlike anything in my day-to-day work life,” she says. What started as part of a forgettable 1L requirement has become an essential element of her life and practice. Coming full circle, Sullivan now finds herself on the other side of things, presiding over practices, listening as students work through issues, and guiding and nurturing their development as she once was through the tradition of Chapman Student Advocacy.