Two teams from the Chapman University Fowler School of Law competed in the regional American Bar Association (ABA) Client Counseling Competition, held virtually February 11-12, with one pair of students finishing on top.

Both Fowler School of Law teams—Tristan Curnow and Alicia Light, and Elizabeth Kim and Kelly Kolar—advanced to the semifinals of the competition, with Kim and Kolar not only making it to the final round, but also emerging as regional champions. Kim and Kolar will advance to the national ABA Client Counseling Competition finals, which will be held March 25-27.

“These teams worked really hard,” said Professor Nancy Schultz, who directs the law school’s competitions program and coached the teams for the ABA competition. “Client interviewing and counseling is complex. The topic was civil rights, and the teams had very little information about what each client was concerned about. But our students handled the clients with professionalism and dignity. I am super proud of them.”

In addition to the ABA competition, two teams of Chapman Law students—Carter Irwin and Michael Sirmay, and James Man and Sara Ross—competed that same weekend in the first-ever Southwestern Law School Negotiation Tournament. Both teams made it through the preliminary rounds and will advance to the next phase of the tournament, which will be held the first weekend of March.