SIXTH-GRADERS GO TO BENCH

STOPPING BY the University of Oregon law school to pick up a schedule for
this weekend's death penalty conference, I noticed a suddenly higher timbre
to the between-class buzz of student voices in the Knight Law Center's
vaulted lobby.

Following the sound up the stairs to the second floor, it led me to the
Orlando Hollis mock courtroom, a space where law students typically hone
their trial skills.

On Thursday, however, the room was filled with Spencer Butte Middle School
students clutching trial briefs and their own notes on high-profile student
rights cases.

For the fourth time in five years, teacher Paul Bodin was bringing his
sixth-grade students to the law school for a robes-on civics lesson.
Rotating roles - from bailiff to attorney to judge - the preteens try
landmark student rights cases.

Outside the door, five class members suited up to portray the U.S. Supreme
Court hearing "Vernonia vs. Acton," in which a seventh-grade football
player challenged his rural Oregon school's decision to randomly drug-test
student athletes.

The law school's black, velvet-striped judicial robes hung so long on the
youngsters' frames, some had to hold the gowns a foot in the air to avoid
entangling them in their sneakers.

Yet there was no snickering from other students as the five filed into
their seats on the elevated bench after mock bailiff Angela Wilson's "All
rise!"

Decorum was diligently observed - except when Nolan Ohmart, portraying an
attorney for Acton, briefly forgot to remove the stocking cap he'd worn on
the nippy walk to the law school from a campus bus stop. Clearly mortified,
he deftly swept it off his head and tossed it on a table behind him.

The astute arguments of the student advocates belied their youthful
ponytails, braces and blue nail polish.

"The school had no probable cause to test Wayne Acton," Nolan argued. "He
was a model student."

But the district had reason to test its athletes, argued Aspen Koch-Fuering
in defense of the school policy. Supposedly role models, half of the
athletes were behaving obnoxiously.

"Drug use was rising," she said. "The school was trying to protect its
students."

"Going out for sports is not mandatory; therefore the drug testing is not
mandatory, either," added Nina Strochlic, a fellow lawyer for the school
district.

THE SMART QUESTIONS of the student justices were also impressive.

"Why not test only the athletes who were acting strangely?" asked "Chief
Justice" Miles Schneider.

"Or why not test all athletes, just to be fair?" probed the justice to his
left, Patrick Moran. "We randomized it so they wouldn't know it was coming
up and stop using drugs just before the test," Nina replied.

UO law professor Margie Paris was surprised but receptive when Bodin first
approached her about bringing such young students to the law school for a
mock court experience.

No high school teacher had even approached her about the idea, she said.

"But I have kids myself, and I realize they have the ability to care about
big issues at an amazingly young age," said Paris, who teaches criminal
procedures and appellate advocacy. "What's really surprised me is their
ability to articulate - in writing and verbally - these complex ideas."

The sixth-graders have consistently shown the maturity to handle the
simulation, she added.

"They're in that courtroom for two hours straight, and they're very
well-behaved, very focused," she said.

"I've noticed the effect is heightened in the new (circa 1999) building.
It's got the decorum of a real courthouse, and I think that impresses them.
They also love the props - the gavel, the bench, the robes."

The students readily cop to the latter charge.

"Sitting up on that bench above everyone else made me feel like I really
was in change," said Tyler Cable.

"I felt like, 'Yes! I have so much power,' " Patrick Moran agreed.

"It made you feel really responsible," Liza Antico added.

Bodin believes that the courtroom experience - and preparing for it with UO
law students - helps his kids learn to think critically and understand the
"shades of gray" that permeate tough ethical questions.

He hopes it will help his students appreciate constitutional law and civics
when they study those topics in U.S. history as eighth-graders.

"That will be a survey, an overview," he said. "This is an in-depth
examination of how the Bill of Rights plays out in real people's lives."