Robert Nanni (1L)
When I got accepted to the University of Toronto Faculty of Law, I was excited for many reasons. Attending school with some of Canada’s brightest minds in one of the most diverse cities was certainly the main attraction—especially because it meant the potential for finding a high-quality husband.
Two months into this whole law school business and I am, shockingly, still unwed. This has me wondering whether I should be looking for my man within the confines of the Jackman Law Building or if my bae-to-be will be somewhere else (perhaps the nearby Medical Sciences Building). Unsure of whether I should date someone at the law school or outside of it, I turned to fellow students at U of T Law to hear their thoughts.
Ellie Minchopoulos (1L) finds comfort in having a boyfriend who is not a law student, explaining that her stress is minimized, rather than added to, by him. “Being with someone who doesn’t care to bring up what happened in Contracts helps me get a much-needed break from the massive adjustment that is 1L,” says Ellie.
While Ellie seeks relief from law-based topics in her significant other, Katie Longo (3L) embraces those topics with her boyfriend, Justin, also a 3L at U of T. “We can chat about legal philosophy or interesting cases that we’ve read,” says Katie. “I often have to hold back when talking to friends because I don’t want to be that annoying person who is always talking about the law.”
The choice of whether to date someone within law school seems to be partly based on your desire to continue the conversation outside the classroom, but that’s hardly the only consideration.
“I would say that the main issue is time,” says Ellie. “The biggest change in our relationship has been that I have to be even more proactive with time management in order to get time with him and, even when I do, it’s less time than I’d like.”
Ellie seems to be making it work so far. However, she recognizes that dating someone in law school would help alleviate scheduling issues, a sentiment that Katie echoes, noting, “Our busy periods are the same, so I don’t feel guilty about spending twelve hours a day in the library during exams because he’s doing it too.”
Although Katie makes a convincing argument for dating someone in law school, she raises quite a striking downside: the combined debt load. Going hundreds of thousands of dollars into debt on your own is quite rough—but double that amount and it’s certainly an overwhelming situation. (Thank gosh for that stellar financial aid program, eh?)
Whether you decide to seek your soulmate within or without the law school will ultimately depend on your own values. While Ellie and Katie both raise strong points on both sides, the choice is yours to make. So long as you find time to balance your relationship with the other facets of life (like readings or something) you’ll be just fine.
As for me, I’m still on #HusbandHunt2017, but I’m over finding one within my program—an extra debt load in exchange for a few discussions about federalism just doesn’t appeal to me as a worthwhile trade-off.
