I had the honour ofcoaching the team that the University of Ottawa sent to the Harold G. Fox Intellectual Property Moot.Today, they come home with both the Gordon F.Henderson Award for the best factum writers and the Donald F. SimAward for the best oral advocate.
Four University of Ottawa students participated: Adrian Howard andSherif Foda argued for the appellant, and Matthew Paik and TavengwaRunyowa argued for the respondent. After two preliminary rounds, Adrianand Sherif advanced to the semi-finals along with only 3 other pairsout of the 16 pairs participating. They argued their case valiantlybefore Justices Sharlow (FCA), Sharpe (Ont CA) and Blair (Ont CA) andreceived excellent feedback on their mastery of the material and theirpresentation.
For their efforts, Tavengwa and Matt won the Gordon F. Henderson Awardfor the best factum writers, and Adrian won the Donald F. Sim Award forthe best oral advocate. Adrian acknowledged the efforts andaccomplishments of the rest of team, noting in his acceptance speech,”This is an individual award for a group effort”. The final round wasMcGill (
Pierre-EmmanuelMoyse coaching) and Western (
MargaretAnn Wilkinson coaching), and Western’s team won the cup.
The University of Ottawa team did very well with a
complex problem(PDF) on copyright and trade-marks. As their coach, I am very proudof the team. I am extremely impressed with their research and writingskills and their ability to internalize the case law in order toconstruct new arguments in each round of the moot as they encounterednew teams with novel approaches to the problem.
Adrian Howard is the VP of the
Law &Technology Student Society, a third year law student, and a futurearticling student at
Gowlingsin Ottawa. Sherif Foda is a second year
droit civil student.Tavengwa Runyowa is a second year
common law student who istaking online
WIPO IP coursesin his spare time. Matthew Paik is a third year droit civil student inthe
LL.L/DVM(international development and globalization) program. Congratulationsto each and all!
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