Santa Clara’s Honors Moot Court Internal Program (HMCI) is an intramural appellate moot court competition in which upper division students develop the oral and written advocacy skills essential for appellate-level litigation. Selected students work in two-person teams to brief complex, contemporary, and unsettled legal issues and argue an appeal in the Supreme Court of the United States before distinguished attorneys, professors, and judges.
Admission: All upper division students who have completed Advocacy or who are currently enrolled in Advocacy are eligible to apply to the HMCI program. For admission, an applicant’s initial brief and oral argument scores from Advocacy are considered, as well as a written application and interview. Applications are typically made available in early September and interviews are conducted in October. While prior experience with public speaking is appreciated, we encourage novices to seek admission with enthusiasm and eagerness to learn. Please advise that while we do take scores from Advocacy courses into consideration, transcripts are not included in the selection process.
Class Requirements: If admitted into the program, students are given permission to enroll in a 2-unit credit/no credit class during the spring semester, which meets approximately seven times, once per week. Units earned through HMCI count as experiential units. During the classroom component of the program, students research the legal issues presented by the competition problem, and in teams of two, prepare a preliminary and final draft of a brief before the Supreme Court. Students then compete in an internal competition in early April in which teams argue for both petitioner and respondent on the issues presented. Competitors participate in practice and preliminary oral arguments and, if selected, advance to quarter-final, semi-final, and final rounds. An awards reception will follow the final competition round.
The Board. The HMCI Board consists of third and fourth year students who serve as mentors, coaches, and leaders for the program. With the guidance of the faculty advisor, the Board reviews and selects program participants, researches, selects, and drafts the competition problem, develops the curriculum for the classroom component of the program, solicits guest judges and brief graders, and administers the spring HMCI competition.
SCU’s 2024-2025 HMCI Board
Hannah Chang
Sukhi Johal
Dannie Kiel
Frank Masi
Alyson Smock
Aaron Stromberg
Clarisse Quintero
The Faculty Advisor. The HMCI Faculty Advisor is Melody Sequoia, whose email address is msequoia@scu.edu.
Interested in Participating in HMCI? Please email the HMCI Board at hmci@scu.edu and/or the HMCI faculty advisor, Melody Sequoia at msequoia@scu.edu and we will contact you with more information.
HMCI 2023 Board and Competitors
HMCI 2023 Semifinalists
HMCI 2023 Semifinalists
HMCI 2023 Finalists