Lake Oswego High School students take second place in contest focusing on building a legal argument.

By Jillian Daley

Social studies teacher Gerrit Koepping can be spotted beaming broadly while walking the halls of Lake Oswego High School these days.

Why is Koepping so ecstatic? Well, one of the reasons, at least, is that his students have been honored for the third year in a row in an annual, national contest. Two of Koepping’s students, LOHS seniors Emma Austin and Jacklin Chang, were second-place finalists in the Harlan Institute-ConScource fifth-annual Virtual Supreme Court Competition last week. The Greenwich High School team from Connecticut may have taken the top spot, but the locals competed against dozens of teams from throughout the nation to make it to the championship round.

Austin and Chang visited Washington, D.C., from May 17-18 for the national contest, where they argued the real-life Supreme Court case of Trinity Lutheran Church v. Comer (for Carol S. Comer, director of the Missouri Department of Natural Resources, the respondent or what criminal cases would call the defendant), Koepping explained. At nationals, the teams had the opportunity to make their case before a panel of federal judges, practicing attorneys and legal activists.

“It was a very hard case to argue, but I think Emma and I did the best we could,” Chang said.

The case asks if the State of Missouri can refuse to give a grant to update a playground because the playground is part of a religious elementary school. Participants must choose a side in early rounds, and the LOHS team chose the state’s side.

“The questions were tough and rivaled the caliber of inquisition from the real court,” Koepping said.

The competition was judged by Honorable Andre Davis, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit; Honorable Meg Ryan, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces; and Honorable Royce Lamberth, U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. Other judges included Ilya Shapiro, senior fellow in Constitutional Studies at the Cato Institute; Elizabeth Wydra, president of the Constitutional Accountability Center; Shon Hopwood, Georgetown University Law Center; Gregory Lipper, Clinton Brook & Peed; Josh Blackman, President of the Harlan Institute; and Julie Silverbrook, executive director of The Constitutional Sources Project.

There was a long list of tough judges assessing this competition. Local high school teams faced the gauntlet of top legal minds including. Shown are, from left: Shon Hopwood, Georgetown University Law Center; Ilya Shapiro, senior fellow in Constitutional Studies at the Cato Institute; Honorable Meg Ryan, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces; Honorable Andre Davis, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit; and Honorable Royce Lamberth, U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia.

“There were really official people asking us really hard questions, and we had to think on the spot,” Chang noted.

It’s particularly nerve-wracking, she said, because the questions are against their side.

“One of the questions they asked us was, ‘Why a playground? There’s nothing religious on it.'”

Austin said the pair had a really tough time with that question, but they did concoct a solid answer.

“I think our response was, ‘It’s what could happen in the future that’s the problem,’ she explained. “We said we don’t know if the school is going to be doing religious activities on the playground, or the school could use that use this money to build a chapel on the playground.”

Hosting the competition was The Harlan Institute — which aims to bring a law school experience into high school classrooms to ensure teens understand fundamental laws — in partnership with The Constitutional Sources Project (ConSource). ConSource aims to increase understanding of the U.S. Constitution and encourage discussion about it among students, teachers, lawyers and judges.

In addition to the ConSource event, the team also got a special treat no LOHS team has had before. A former student of Koepping’s gave the visiting Lakers a behind-the-scenes tour of the real Supreme Court. The student is Chief Justice John Roberts’ personal assistant, and the group was able to engage in a short chat with the justice himself.

Chang said “it was really cool,” and the group got to ask him questions about U.S. government and told him about the case they were arguing. He was familiar with it and asked which side they were arguing.

Austin said Roberts also wanted to talk about how the Supreme Court is represented in schools and how students should learn about them. She said it was important for him for students and teachers to know that the Supreme Court is separate from politics.

She said she learned that the High Court’s main concern is with interpretations of the law, not the current political noise.

“I thought the experience was really great,” Austin said, “and while it was short trip, I thought it was amazing because we got to do a lot of things in high school that I would probably never have gotten to do if I hadn’t done this.”