Judge

Too many mock trial judges don’t know they’re getting into. We make sure our judges do.

REGISTER AS A JUDGE FOR THE DECEMBER (12/13-/15/24) COMPETITION HERE.

Make sure your competitor entry form is submitted no later than one week before the tournament deadline, and that your judges have been submitted no later than the Monday before the tournament deadline.

Judging Rules (in addition to what’s outlined on the Rules tab)

  1. In general, any high school graduate with experience in mock trial coaching or competition, or real-life legal experience, is allowed to volunteer. Volunteering does not constitute a guarantee of being accepted to judge. A high school graduate means someone who has received their diploma or equivalent and no longer attends high school.

  2. All judges should be familiar with all rules described on our website’s rules page before entering.

  3. Judges will have an opportunity to have a Q&A meeting the week leading up to each competition. If they can’t make that meeting, they’ll be sent a recording of it.

  4. Before a judge is allowed to view rounds, they’ll need to submit a registration form. This will require them to fill out an in-depth paradigm describing their mock trial experience and preferences.

  5. Judges are not entitled to behave inappropriately, which includes (but is not limited to) making comments that are discriminatory, suggestive, belittling, or otherwise pose a risk to the mental or emotional well-being and development of students. All behavioral disputes will be documented and shared with our partners at MockOn.

  6. As of our third competition of the 2022-2023 season, judges will be nominated at the end of the tournament for Outstanding Judge awards. Students will nominate their judges based on the quality of their verbal and written feedback. Judges who receive multiple nominations will be honored with certificates.

Judge Instructions

  1. You’ll be able to access your ballots through https://tabeasy.org/. You’ll be sent your unique login/password within a day before the competition.

  2. Do NOT score competitors up or down based on their accents. There are plenty of international students. Students should not be penalized for not speaking with a General American accent.

  3. Here’s a video of how to use https://tabeasy.org/ from a judges’ perspective. Please review it. https://tabeasy.org/ will automatically include things like a presiders’ script, the rules, the case, etc.

  4. Your ballot will not automatically populate with names until the contestants submit their captains’ meetings forms.

  5. Presiders AND scoring judges should have videos on at all times in the round.

  6. You should not attempt to complete your ballot or view the round from your phone. A laptop or desktop setup will make things easier.

  7. If you’re judging, we’ve marked your presiding/scoring preferences in our https://tabeasy.org/ system.

  8. Make sure to often ‘save’ on your ballot as you go, and only click the check marks to ‘submit’ the ballot at the end after scoring and ranking all contestants. Both items are in the top right of the ballot.

  9. We expect to have two judges in every round. One will preside, one will score. This means not every judge will be used in every round. We expect there to be some no-shows, so we’re thankful for so many volunteers for giving us a buffer. We’ll prioritize putting in judges who are only available for one round and judges who don’t have conflicts.

Order of Operations for Rounds

  1. Primary contacts will be sent your https://tabeasy.org/ login information (a unique username and password).

  2. 15 minutes before the round, students should begin logging on to the Zoom calls.

  3. Once students are on the calls, they should go to their breakout rooms.

  4. Once in the breakout rooms, captains should share any demonstratives with each other. Captains should also fill out their https://tabeasy.org/ captains’ form. HOWEVER, they should not do so at the same time–only one captain needs to fill it in and save it. The others can double-check it. You also need to press ‘submit’ (it’s in the top right of the ballot).

  5. If you’re having trouble logging into your tabeasy.org account, you may be confusing certain lowercase or uppercase letters that look similar. Copy-paste the specific letters you were sent.

  6. Judges, please stay in the main room until you’re told where to go. Judges will be assigned to their rooms.

  7. After judges perform a conflict check, wait for the all-clear. When the all-clear is given, the round can start.

  8. After all ballots are submitted, judges can give verbal comments.