IIT Chicago-Kent to compete in the Tournament of Champions
IIT Chicago-Kent College of Law has been invited to compete in the National Institute of Trial Advocacy's Tournament of Champions taking place October 28 to 31 at the United States District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania. This is the fourth consecutive year and the ninth time in the history of the competition that Chicago-Kent has been invited to participate.
Hosted this year by Duquesne University School of Law, the Tournament of Champions is one of the most prestigious law school trial competitions in the country. Each year, 16 schools from the nation's nearly 200 law schools are invited to participate. Invitations are based on a three-year performance record at the National Trial Competition and the National Student Trial Advocacy Competition and in prior Tournament of Champions competitions.
Jeremiah Lewellen, Julie Levinson, Joe Carlasare and Rachel Remke will represent Chicago-Kent in the Tournament of Champions. The team will be coached by David A. Erickson, retired Illinois Appellate Court Justice and director of the law school's Trial Advocacy Program, along with adjunct professors Nicholas A. Caputo '01 and David Lavin and alumnae Dee Brown Lee '97, and Sulema Medrano '09.
Third-year students Jeremiah Lewellen and Julie Levinson were members of the Chicago-Kent teams that finished in third place in last year's Tournament of Champions and as semifinalists in the National Trial Competition's regional tournament.
Jeremiah Lewellen earned his undergraduate degree from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign with a major in history and a minor in English. In June 2010 Lewellen represented Chicago-Kent at the inaugural Top Gun Trial Competition. Teammate Julie Levinson graduated magna cum laude from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign with a degree in speech communication with a concentration in psychology. Second-year student Joe Carlasare graduated magna cum laude with a bachelor's degree in political science and philosophy with a minor in economics from Loyola University Chicago. Teammate Rachel Remke, also a second-year student, graduated magna cum laude from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign with a double major in political science and psychology.
Chicago-Kent College of Law is the law school of Illinois Institute of Technology, a private, Ph.D.-granting institution with programs in engineering, psychology, architecture, business, design and law. Chicago-Kent's trial advocacy teams have won numerous individual student honors and regional and national competitions, including the 1988, 2007 and 2008 National Trial Competition championships. In 2008, Chicago-Kent became the first law school to win both the National Trial Competition and the National Moot Court Competition in the same year.
