About the 2025 Invitational

The Wayne State Taft Transactional Law Invitational offers students an exciting opportunity to compete against law students from across the nation and to hone their drafting, negotiating, and counseling skills. The students will represent either the buyer or seller in a complex acquisition. Throughout the winter semester, teams from various schools focus on drafting and revising transactional agreements and completing mark-ups of opposing counsel's drafts. Schools may send one or two teams depending on availability. The culmination of this effort is a day of live negotiations, where teams from each law school compete in two rounds of negotiations. A panel of Metro Detroit M&A attorneys judges both the drafts and the negotiation sessions, providing individualized feedback and determining which teams most effectively represent their clients based on established guidelines. 

2024 Competitors

• University of Kansas School of Law 
• Widener University Commonwealth Law School
• University of Mississippi School of Law 
• Southern Methodist University Dedman School of Law 
• Charleston School of Law 
• St. Mary’s University School of Law 
• William and Mary Law School 
• Baylor University School of Law 
• University of Missouri-Kansas City Law School 
• University of Arizona James E. Rogers College of Law 
• University of Oregon School of Law 
• Brooklyn Law School 
• Georgetown University Law Center 
• University of San Diego School of Law 
• Southern University Law Center 
• DePaul School of Law 
• St. Thomas University Law School 
• Washburn University School of Law 
• Michigan State University College of Law 
• University of Tennessee College of Law 
• Wayne State Law School 

2025 Invitational Date

The tentative problem release is scheduled for mid-January, with the competition taking place on March 21st, 2025. 

The competition is typically hosted in Southfield, Michigan, at the offices of Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP, our sponsor. We will provide periodic updates on the competition logistics to ensure that teams from outside the Metro Detroit area have sufficient time to coordinate travel arrangements. 

If you have questions, please contact the student chairpersons. The student chairpersons for the 2024-25 school year are Lena Vushaj (lena.vushaj@wayne.edu), Lydia Dunn (lydia.dunn@wayne.edu), Erli Metko (metko@wayne.edu), and Christian Sarafa (christiansarafa@wayne.edu).