The UB Mock Trial club, which specializes in acting out fictional hearings and cases, is suffering from fiscal problems that are anything but moot.
Although funded by the Student Association, under the Special Interest Service and Hobbies Council, many club members say the real difficulty is not competing against Ivy League teams or making it all the way to Nationals - which the team has done consistently for the past three years - but that the greatest trial is receiving enough funds to compete.
According to Carrie Zimbardi, a team captain and junior legal studies major, the budget for UB Mock Trial at the start of this year was $1,900. In comparison, one of the University of South Carolina's teams has a budget of $40,000.
"At the end of last year we tried to appeal our budget but no avail, but that did not detour our dedicated team. Mock Trial really is more like a sports team than just a regular special interest club," Zimbardi said. "We are always held back by only being able to drive to our tournaments, when the most competitive tournaments are held in the West."
Zimbardi said nearly all Mock Trial teams are coached by a paid staff-member. Coaches manage budgets, as well as the many teams they run.
"Not only do we not have the budget like most other schools do, but we also don't have a coach. We are entirely self ran and self coached," Zimbardi said.
According to SA President Dela Yador, the problem is that there is only so much money SA has to give.
"The unfortunate part is, with clubs, you have clubs that do very well one year, and then other clubs don't do very well in the next year," he said. "And a lot of those clubs need a lot of funding."
In addition to fundraising at football and basketball games, Zimbardi said UB Mock Trial has sought support from other places outside SA.
Dennis Black, UB vice president for Student Affairs, helped secure $1,000 for the group, and SISH Council Coordinator Ayo Onikute gave $600 while a Sub-Board I, Inc. grant allotted $1,000 for gas money for a tournament North Carolina.
"We had to drive down to Campbell, North Carolina," said Craig Wrapp, team member and a junior political science major. "Teams down there have thousands and thousands of dollars to spend on hotels and coaches and flights."
Zimbardi says that UB Mock Trial members had "just enough money to make it to Regionals, and if we get to Nationals, like we have the past 3 years, we're going to have a problem."
Nationals will be in Des Moines, Iowa, or St. Petersburg, Fla., both of which would require airfare for team members.
Yador said that he "didn't know that this was the case," with UB Mock Trial. Considering their success and financial hardship, some type of plan would be necessary to allow UB Mock Trial to compete, he said.
For the group's last tournament at Cornell, they tried to save money by only staying one night in a hotel, which meant leaving for Cornell at 4 a.m. and arriving just an hour before the trials.
"(We) did the same thing the next morning at 8 a.m. We had two more three-hour long trials, and in the end we beat every other team there. Imagine how well we could be doing if we had more funding," Zimbardi said.
UB Mock Trial also belongs to the American Mock Trial Association, which is the governing body for the 500-plus schools that compete. After teams register with the AMTA and receive a case (for $900), the team starts preparing for invitational tournaments. Tournaments are hosted by schools around the country, including UB this past December.
Invitationals dictate which teams go to the regional tournaments, which will be held this year from Feb. 24-26.
"At Regionals, you must qualify at least top six out of about 30 teams to move on the Nationals," Zimbardi said. "(Going to) Nationals is every team's goal at the start of the year, but it is very hard to get to. UB has sent a team to nationals for the last three years, and intends to keep the streak alive."
UB's three teams within the club owe much of that streak to the practice they put in, sometimes going until midnight Monday through Thursday.
"A lot of time outside of practice is expected of the members," Zimbardi said. "Not only in preparing their roles, but being an SA club we also have community service, fundraising, and SA event requirements to fulfill. In addition to all of this we also travel a lot to compete and this is where we are financially strained."
In a mock trial, both sides of the case are tried. Judges rate the teams on how well they did, both the "attorneys" on their argument and the "witnesses" on their acting.
Like a federal court, the team uses federal rules and proper courtroom procedure.
"When we use objections we actually use real objections that real attorneys would use," Wrapp said. "You can go and just watch, and not compete - it's fun to watch."
Because of the amount of time that they commit to their "sport" of choice, some members of mock trial clubs at other schools are given class credit for participating.
"Our biggest success yet this year came at our Ivy League competition at Cornell two weekends ago. Our "A" team went 8-0 undefeated and took home first place out of more than twenty nationally ranked teams," Zimbardi said. "This is an awesome sign for our upcoming Regional."
Photo: Courtesy of Laron Fomby
