It’s official: I’m trading in my press pass for a power
suit.
This fall I’ll be attending Brigham Young University’s J. Reuben
Clark Law School in Provo, Utah; and, if all goes well, in just over three
years I’ll be a lawyer!
Several things factored into this decision, which has been
in the back of my mind for a while. First, I come from a long line of Jewish
lawyers and I felt someone needed to carry on the family business. (I had
Fiddler on the Roof’s Tevye singing “Tradition” in the back of my mind.)
Second, lawyers earn more money than small town editors. Third, I kind of like
school and I think studying law will be rewarding.
Obviously, you don’t just wake up one day and sign up for
law school. I’ve been working towards this for a while. The first obstacle was
the LSAT (Law School Admission Test), which is a challenging exam that tests
your reading comprehension and logical reasoning skills.
Many prospective students take prep classes to conquer this
test, but since I lived in Merritt I just studied on my own from preparation
workbooks and practice exams. I had to be diligent and squeeze in as much study
time as I could in between newspaper deadlines and city council meetings, but
in the end it paid off. I wrote the test the day before I flew to Guatemala,
which was a week after I moved back to Coquitlam. My overall score put me in
the 85th percentile.
When I returned from Central America, I began the
application process. This included writing personal essays, gathering letters
of recommendation and requesting school transcripts. I sent applications to
BYU, the University of Alberta and Dalhousie University (in Halifax).
In February I learned that I had been accepted to both the U
of A and BYU, which I was pretty excited about. Choosing between the two was
extremely difficult though — both had great law programs. I want to practice in
Canada, so Alberta seemed like a good choice; however, my heart was leaning
towards BYU so I followed those feelings. To return to Canada, I’ll have to
write a few additional exams, but it’s doable.
(This week I received an email from Dalhousie that I was
accepted there as well. Perhaps it’s better that the decision came late or I
would have been agonizing even more about where to go. But, it’s rewarding to
know that I had my pick of the schools I applied to.)
Now, I have a few months left to save up money for school
before I move to Provo. I’m excited for the challenge ahead, and haven’t had
time to get too nervous. I’m not sure exactly what kind of law I’d like to
practice, but hopefully that will become clear as I learn.
