Why Harvard makes you show a student ID to get into the library

“Excuse me, could you tell us the way to Emerson Hall?”

The student we’d asked was leaning up against a tree I wasn’t rich enough to lean up against, reading a book I wasn’t smart enough to read.  He was helpful, but the stoic frown on his face indicated this sort of thing happened all the time.  We were, after all, right outside of Harvard Yard on an afternoon so nice it looks photoshopped in the pictures we took.

 

My UMass mock trial co-captain and I started walking in the direction the helpful Harvard student had pointed.  We were visiting his campus as competitiors at one of the most reknown academic competitions on the east coast, and he was probably studying for an exam Monday.  He was a student, we were tourists.

Tourists, in fact, were all around. 

“This would be obnoxious,” a freshman teammate had joked during our impromptu lunch in Harvard Yard, “Can you imagine tour groups of 50 people with video cameras coming through to make sure they captured the moment they first saw the W.E.B. DuBois library? While you’re laying out studying?”

I thought back to the dozens of university tours I’d given here at UMass over the summer while working as a freshman orientation counselor.  I could not imagine this.

Depending on your level of extreme pride and/or denial, you might say we were underdogs that weekend.  The full roster of teams included Brown, Harvard, Yale, Dartmouth, Cornell, Boston College, Boston University, Villanova, Princeton, Wellesley and various other schools attended by Presidents, First Ladies and various cast members of Harry Potter.  This is why one our other freshmen quipped, “When you saw Brown in the captains’ meeting, was Emma Watson there?”

This is also why, as eye-roll worthy as it’s going to sound, we were glad the tournament directors listed us in the event program as “The University of Massachusetts at Amherst” instead of “UMass.”

Good thing we weren ‘t the only underdog in town-there was a team there from Illinois’ Elgin Community College as well.  You’ve never heard of it, but you have now.  I bet it was no coincidence they were listed in the tournament program as, simply, “Elgin,” and I bet they were glad, too. 

What I didn’t bet, before the weekend, was that by the time Elgin Community College left Cambridge that weekend, they’d have defeated teams from both Yale and Princeton. I found this little nugget out here, where I also discovered that Elgin Community College President David Sam flew to Boston to attend the tournament.

Well, well, well.  We here at UMass (understandably) didn’t get quite that big of a response, but we were grateful enough for an article in the Daily Collegian  and financial support from a university grant we’d waited 3 weeks to hear about-to see if we’d get the chance to stand toe-to-toe with the Ivies. 

3 weeks where we practiced every weeknight for 3+ hours after classes, known affectionally by the team as “Hell Weeks.”

3 weeks of strategizing, balancing practice with academics and telling friends, parents and professors, “Sorry I smell, I haven’t had time to do laundry. Yeah, the Harvard tournament.”

In the past 3 weeks, I think UMass football kicker Armando Cuko and I had more in common than we probably ever will again, because mock trial fully morphed into the academic equivalent of an NCAA division 1 sport.

 As team co-captain and a founding member of UMass mock trial, I was usually an attorney, which in mock trial is like being the the closer,  the point guard, the quarterback, the goalkeeper.  But this weekend, the team needed a witness…A witness in mock trial is like the kicker in football.  You only get noticed if you screw up or break a statistical record. A veteran college mock trial attorney being a witness is like Tim Wakefield coming in to pitch the 8th inning of a playoff game where the bullpen is spent. 

 So I did. We went 4-4, beating Villanova and BC.  People are saying “Congratulations,” but as far as I’m concerned, we only went 4-4.  The work has just begun.

Advertisement