Comets win international championship in dispute resolution competition

TYLER BURKHARDT Editor-in-Chief

On November 13, a team of Comets claimed the title of world champions for UTD at the International Academy for Dispute Resolution mediation contest.

First-time competitors Hadia Siddiqui, a psychology senior, and Ifunanya Ngadi, an ITS senior, were selected to represent UTD in the final round after strong performances in the preliminaries. Despite technical difficulties limiting them to a fraction of their usual prep time, they took home the championship title for UTD – the team’s third since 2014. They also won an invitation to compete against mediation teams fielded by law schools in the spring.

Siddiqui attributed a large part of her success to the mentorship she received from team captain Veda Tsai, an interdisciplinary studies senior, both before and during the competition.

“At first, I was super nervous about it, but it helped that I was under the guidance of Veda, and the first round I was assigned advocate, so I got to work with her,” Siddiqui said.

Business administration senior Jared Pugh jumped in: “[Veda] is the heart and soul of the program. She’s the glue, if you will.”

Pugh, who was named All-American after placing sixth individually, also had an atypical experience at the competition. He was tapped the morning of the competition to compete with another UTD student on a hybrid team with a competitor from Principia College, and, on one hour of training, managed to perform exceptionally well.

“It was pretty interesting,” Pugh said of the experience. “I feel like I hit it off really easily with them, and while we only met 40 minutes before our first competition, my teammates were awesome. They were able to save me a couple of times, and competing was a really fun process at the end of the day.”

After her team qualified for the finals, Tsai chose Siddiqui and Ngadi to represent UTD, leaving herself out of the final round. To further complicate matters, the Comets did not initially receive all of the necessary information for their round.

“Normally, they give you some secret facts about the case ahead of the round,” Siddiqui said. “And, we were supposed to get them at least 30 minutes before the round started, but we actually ended up with only 10 minutes to prepare. But, we still won – it was pretty intense.”

The mediation team’s coach, Tony Seagroves – who also coaches Mock Trial –was voted Coach of the Year by the other coaches. Tsai attributed a lot of the team’s success to the kind of preparation Seagroves gives them. What is a semester-long class for many schools gets condensed into six hours for the Comets who compete: a four-hour training session on a Sunday, and two hours of preparation before the competition begins.

Seagroves says the secret to UTD’s success – all three first-place finishes have been

Once they get FDA approval, the team and company would like to start clinical trials. There’s a chance that their approach can be employed to other forms of cancer treatment as well.

“We think our strategies will have a lot of groundbreaking potential for chemotherapy, radiotherapy and amino therapy, and we’ve come across a method that’ll improve all types of therapy – not just neuroblastoma,” Sirsi said.

“So, over winter break, I will be doing a lot of sleeping and playing animal crossing."

- Katie Strand, Mechanical Engineering Junior

“I was trying to apply for internships and [something] for my summer break. And I need to prepare for other things for my coming semesters.”

- Kumar Kumtsam, Computer Engineering Masters

“I’m planning to visit family in Pakistan, so I’ll be traveling abroad.”

- Sana Khan, Biology Sophomore