Campbell Law advocates win Campbell Vis Pre-Moot Competition

RALEIGH - Campbell Law School advocates won the first edition of the Campbell Vis Pre-Moot Competition, held on Saturday, Feb. 21.

The prevailing team, representing Campbell Law, consisted of Edmund Gunther '26 and Abigail Sholes '27. The second and third places in the teams' tournament were occupied by advocates from the University of Bucharest: Petra Rusu and Catalin Pantiru (2nd place) and Patricia Tataru and Crina Teleoaca (3rd place). The winning teams received cash awards: $1,000 for first place, $500 for second place and $300 for third place.

Additionally, Campbell Law's Gunther won best male oralist while Rusu of the University of Bucharest won best female oralist. They each won cash awards of $100.

The Campbell Vis Pre-Moot is part of the Willem C. Vis International Commercial Arbitration Moot, now at its 33rd edition (Austria) and respectively at its 23rd edition (Hong Kong).

In addition to Vis teams from the University of Bucharest and Campbell Law, competitors from the University of South Carolina also participated, explained Professor Raluca Papadima, who organized the event and coached the Campbell Law Vis team along with Nicholas Wilkins '26.

The competition, which was sponsored by Hutchens Law and Ricci Law firms, included a networking reception on Friday at Taverna Agora and three rounds of oral arguments on Saturday. The aggressive schedule required students to be able to switch on a moment's notice from representing one of the parties to representing the other party. Professor Emeritus Scott Pryor was among the judges for the competition along with a number of alumni including the law school's Board of Visitors Chair John McCabe '94 and Scott Flowers '03.

"I would like to thank all of our competitors, our alumni judges, Professor Pryor, our generous sponsors and all of our student volunteers who helped make our first Campbell Vis Pre-Moot a huge success," Papadima said.

The Willem C. Vis International Commercial Arbitration Moot is a competition for law students to foster the study and practice of international commercial sales law and arbitration. Students from 80 countries participated in the previous edition of the Vis Moot. The Vis Moot involves a dispute arising out of a contract of sale between two companies from member countries to the United Nations Convention on Contracts for the International Sale of Goods. The contract provides that any dispute that might arise is to be settled by arbitration in a country that has enacted the UNCITRAL Model Law on International Commercial Arbitration and is a party to the Convention on the Recognition and Enforcement of Foreign Arbitral Awards. The arbitral rules to be applied rotate yearly among the arbitration rules of co-sponsoring institutions of the Moot. For the 33rd Vis Moot, the arbitration rules of the Singapore International Arbitration Center are applicable.

The purpose of the Vis Moot is to foster the study of international commercial law and arbitration and provide practical training for resolving international business disputes. There are two crucial phases in the Vis Moot to train advocacy skills: the writing of memoranda and the presentation of arguments in oral hearings held before arbitration practitioners and academics.

In the pairings of teams for each general round, every effort is made to have civil law schools argue against common law schools, so each may learn from approaches taken by persons trained in another legal culture. Similarly, the arbitrators judging the rounds come from both common law and civil law backgrounds.

Campbell Law advocates recently advanced to the semi-finals in the John B. Tieder Jr. Vis Pre-Moot Competition organized by Watt, Tieder, Hoffar and Fitzgerald LLP in conjunction with the George Mason University Antonin Scalia Law School Moot Court Board (MCB).

The Campbell Law team will head to Hong Kong in March to compete in the 23rd edition of the competition.

ABOUT CAMPBELL LAW SCHOOL

Since its founding in 1976, Campbell Law has developed lawyers who possess moral conviction, social compassion, and professional competence, and who view the law as a calling to serve others. Among its accolades, the school has been recognized by the American Bar Association (ABA) as having the nation's top Professionalism Program and by the American Academy of Trial Lawyers for having the nation's best Trial Advocacy Program. Campbell Law boasts more than 5,000 alumni, who make their home in nearly all 50 states and beyond. In 2026, Campbell Law is celebrating 50 years of graduating legal leaders and 17 years of being located in a state-of-the-art facility in the heart of North Carolina's Capital City.

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