TROPHY CASE—La Reina High mock trial coach Liz Harlacher has led the Regents to county, state and national titles. IRIS SMOOT/Acorn Newspapers Liz Harlacher gushes when she talks about her speech and mock trial students at La Reina High.

“By the time (they) leave our school . . . they are really ready to be effective leaders in whatever arena they choose,” said Harlacher, 51. “They’re confident and they have so much poise. They’re really smart, effective communicators.”

Harlacher’s seventh-period class prepares students to compete on La Reina’s mock trial team. The class is an elective for the 70 or so students on the speech team, which Harlacher has been coaching for nine years.

As mock trial coach, Harlacher has led La Reina teams to two state championships—in 2008 and 2011.

La Reina teams have won 16 mock trials at the county level, but it wasn’t until Harlacher came on board in 2007 that the school’s team placed among the top in California. La Reina took third place in that year.

As California champions, La Reina teams have competed twice at the national level. In 2008, the school placed 25th out of 42 competitors. Last month, at the 28th annual National High School Mock Trial Championship in Phoenix, La Reina took 16th place out of 47 competitors.

A cashier at a local grocery store recently asked about the outcome of the national competition. After Harlacher answered him, his response was a conciliatory, “Well, at least you had fun.”

“I thought, ‘Oh my God, you have no idea how hard that was,’” Harlacher said. “We should get a rose parade for that—16th is great.”

The coach’s favorite moment at the competition came when one of her students modeled the sort of behavior Harlacher hopes to instill in the teens. The La Reina student, playing an attorney know for aggressive cross-examination, was questioning another student portraying a witness on the stand.

The “witness,” a student from a competing team, became ill during her testimony. The La Reina student asked the witness if she needed to be excused, and she said yes. When the witness was unable to return to the competition, the La Reina student told the faux judge that she’d agree to have an attorney from the competing team fill in for her.

When the round was over, the judge commended the La Reina student.

“Because it was so unusual in the heat of competition for someone to be so compassionate,” Harlacher said. “There wasn’t a dry eye—all the parents in the room thought that was so moving.”

Harlacher tells her students that resilience, not perfection, is the goal. She uses as an example Olympic ice skaters, who quickly rebound after a fall and don’t let the slip affect their performance.

“That really leads to success,” Harlacher said.

“I’m always so proud when another team does well (and) my team is the first . . . to leap to their feet and applaud because they know what it takes to get there.”

Betsy Potts, La Reina English teacher for 37 years and now the school’s alumnae director, said Harlacher has a calm and gentle presence.

“I just think that La Reina High School is fortunate and blessed to have somebody of her caliber. Her dedication is absolutely to the students,” Potts said. “And she has no ego about this. It’s all about others; it’s all about the kids.”

Harlacher accompanies her speech team students to competitions throughout the state. That means being away from her family some 32 weekends out of the year.

“That’s a great personal sacrifice,”

Potts said. “I think that speaks not just to her dedication but to the kind of person she is—she sacrifices for others.”

Harlacher joined the La Reina faculty in 2002, after serving two years as a volunteer speech coach at a Camarillo fourth-througheighth grade school her daughters attended.

Now 19 and 21, Harlacher’s daughters are La Reina graduates who attend Cal Poly Pomona.

Harlacher happened upon a career as a speech coach. After graduating from high school, she attended junior college in Texas, focusing on theater and communication. An aspiring actress, she moved to Los Angeles and studied at the Lee Strasberg Theatre and Film Institute, graduating in 1984. For several years, Harlacher taught musical theater, movement for actors and ballet at the institute. But she put her aspirations aside after marrying Mark Harlacher, an anesthesiologist, and becoming a mother.

What are her plans for the future?

“More of the same,” she said.

“It’s really rewarding work,” Harlacher said.

She and her husband live in Camarillo.