Around The College

Monash University Witness Examination Competition

On the 29th of October 2019, Ms Roberts, Beth McDonald, Natalie Vujmilovic, Nancy Huang and myself went to Monash University Law School to compete at the year 10 and 11 Moot Court competition.

Witness examination is a process used within the court of law that aims to extract evidence from witnesses. Both the prosecution and defence have an examiner in chief and two junior counsels, one of which cross examines the other team’s witness and the other reinforces our main arguments in a closing statement.

The case for which we were the defence for involved the defendant, Martin Jackson, being accused of insurance fraud. This came about due to a series of events, yet mainly included him losing his job, his wife being off work due to pregnancy and the fact that he was one month behind in rent. When Martin’s beloved car was mysteriously set alight, detectives involved in the case quickly pointed to Mr Jackson as the culprit, despite unreliable witness statement, stating that he burned his car in order to get the insurance money.

In our mock trial for this case, Beth McDonald superbly acted the role of Martin Jackson, and gave a very convincing statement about both the events of the night in which the car was stolen and set alight, as well as the reasons why the defendant could not possibly be the culprit. I was the senior counsel, a role that required me to ask our witness to retell their side of the story and to guide them into retelling facts that support our argument and convince the jury that our client is not guilty. Natalie Vujmilovic was the first junior counsel and worked to cross examine the witness for the prosecution. The role of a cross examiner is to attempt to discredit the testimony of the witness for the opponent and create a sense of doubt for the jury, in order for them to better support our argument. Finally, Nancy Huang made an impactful closing statement about why the defendant could not be guilty and made a final attempt to discredit the opponent’s evidence and arguments.

For the competition, we versed Nossal, but despite our hard work and outstanding performance on the day, the Judge decided in favour of Nossal on the slimmest of margins. We are all extremely proud of how far we have come with our legal knowledge and skills; we worked really hard to represent Brentwood. We are so incredibly thankful for the opportunity Miss Roberts gave us to compete in this competition and the unlimited support she gave us in its duration. As a group we strongly recommend anyone interested in law or the legal system to take part in the various competitions held throughout the year!

Jodhi West

Year 8 Information Technology ‘Shark Tank’ Incursion with Peter Hitchener

On Monday 11th of November I was very fortunate to have Peter Hitchener come in to the school and be a guest judge for the Shark Tank assessment item.

All students were given the opportunity to present their ‘Future Technology’ where students create an idea for a new, innovative and futuristic piece of technology with the idea of helping someone or improving people’s lives. The focus was centred around medical, environmental, entertainment or travel improvements. Five groups from various classes presented their ideas, and I must say how impressed I was with the quality of the students work. Their ideas were persuasively conveyed to both the class and judges in a very articulate manner.

Towards the end of the class, students were given the opportunity to ask Peter about current affairs, how the news is put together and have photos taken with him. It was a very engaging experience both for the students and myself, and I thank Peter for giving up his time, coming out to see the students present their futuristic ideas.

“It was really a fantastic opportunity”, Jacinta Jenner of Year 8 says who did a magnificent job presenting her teams idea on a Laser Printing Laptop. ‘It was a terrific opportunity to meet Peter and a really special day to present to someone different and well known other than teachers. It also inspired us to work harder on the project because we wanted to make sure it was really good and read well’.

Congratulations to all the presenters – You did a great job and everyone clearly put a lot of effort to ensure an A grade presentation.

Chris Barry, Year 8 Information Technology