Chicago-Kent Team Advances as Co-Champions in Regional ABA National Appellate Advocacy Competition

Chicago-Kent students continued to show off their fantastic advocacy skills this weekend. Hayley Loufek and Ryan Martin, coached by Shaunagh McGoldrick and Scott LaMunyon, finished as regional co-champions in the American Bar Association's regional National Appellate Advocacy Competition! Four teams from each region share the co-champion title and then advance to the national rounds of ABA NAAC, which are April 7-9 this year. Ryan also took home an award for 6th best oralist.

Their problem centered on whether a corporation can be held liable under Title III of the ADA after a blind individual, while performing ADA compliance testing, could not access all parts of a candy company’s website. The case asks if a commercial website be considered a place of public accommodation under Title III of the ADA and, if not, if Title III of the ADA can be applied to a commercial website based on a nexus to a physical store.

Guest judges for the team included Profs. Emily Aleisa, Doug Godfrey, Kari Johnson, and Greg Reilly, alumni Matt Cannon, Kristen Merritt, Cait Sinclair, and Caroline Teichner, and current students Hannah Bucher, Nicole Jansma, Madeline Moore, Elizabeth Osmanski, Jacob Skolnik Taylor Shuman, Julia Veeser, Andy White, and Zelpha Williams. Thank you all for your help--it was invaluable!

An in-depth story on the competition will be posted on Chicago-Kent's website soon.