A team of University of Tennessee College of Law students has placed second in the 2021 L. Edward Bryant, Jr. National Health Law Transactional Competition.
Second-year law students Matt Arent, Grace Ewell and Braxton Kinney competed against 27 teams in late March in the virtual event hosted by Loyola University Chicago School of Law. With their second place finish, they will each receive a $400 award.
The competition is aimed at helping law students develop corporate and transactional lawyering skills specifically in the field of health law. Their coach and professor Zack Buck said the students spent hundreds of hours throughout the last four months preparing a memorandum and developing their solution to a very technical health care transactional problem.
“They represented UT with skill and class, and it was a total joy to work with them,” Buck said. “They clearly stand poised for very successful careers in health care transactional work should they wish to pursue them.”
The competition involved several professors from a number of law schools in preparing the problem and 35 health lawyers, including leading partners from major health law firms, in-house counsel, government attorneys and advisers, to judge the competition and play the role of the client during oral presentations.
Buck said the College of Law team’s success demonstrates students’ growing interest in the practice of health law, and the school’s commitment to broadening offerings for students.
“This is the best finish UT Law has ever achieved in our four years of participating in the competition,” Buck said. “We’re dedicated to educating and graduating talented students who are ready to handle the most complex legal matters that impact and shape the American health care system.”