Boston University School of Law

I have a 3^rd installment of my “Inclusion” post lined up next, but I haven’t told you about my little man lately, so here’s an update about how he’s helping me rethink student debt. He still dominates the couch I wrote about 1L year, and recently, as I sat next to him queuing up a rental Toy Story 3 DVD while my wife made popcorn, he told me: “This spot is for my mom when she gets back so you better have to move somewhere else.” But I have the upper hand when it matters, for example, when we need to get out of the house in the morning.

Typically, my wife is off to BU-affiliated Boston Medical Center where she’s part of a maternal depression prevention research grant, my son is off to BU Children’s Center and I’m off to one of the moot court rooms on the 6^th floor of the tower to prepare for my classes which are all after 2pm (oops, I’ve given away one of my secret study spots). I’m a morning person, so having the mornings free for class prep as a 2L is an ideal set-up given that lessons are largely self-taught pre-class—with no small effort—then revisited in class as professors highlight why the cases matter to lawyers.

We try to leave the apartment together before 8:30am, depending on wild card time-busters like getting socks and shoes on my son’s feet. (Earlier exits make it more likely that I’ll have time for midday programming to encourage me about law’s social leverage—Ruha Devanesan (BU Law ’09) of Peacetones and Jeffrey Haas of People’s Law Office are recent favorite speakers.) Here’s what the conversation to get out of the door in the morning sometimes looks like:

Dad: OK, time to put your shoes on.

Nahum: I’m not ready yet. I’m still playing.

Dad: You’ll play at preschool.

Nahum: I want a gummy.

Dad: You can have a gummy after you put your shoes on.

Nahum: OK, I’m ready to put my shoes on. I want it (i.e. the gummy).

Dad: But you didn’t actually put your shoes on yet.

Nahum: First the gummy, then the shoes.

Rye crispbread crackers (left) are not typically requested by my son in the morning, unlike chewy multivitamin gummies (right), which are.

Now don’t go analyzing my parenting skills here—unless it’s to note something positive, in which case analyze away—but I tend to give him the gummy, then he tends to puts on his shoes. And then we leave peaceably (like I said, I have the upper hand). I tell myself in this exchange that he’s mature enough to limit his future options with a promise so he can get something out of that promise up front. It’s not so different from student loans—borrowing out of our future earnings, using it now and earning it later. And for scholarships, with which BU Law is particularly generous, the analogy is even more direct: first the pay, then the work.

Of course, there are no strings attached to money for education other than being in school while getting it, but choosing to attach positive promises beyond the degree is an opportunity to feel charged with something to live up to, instead burdened with something to live under. We can even accept student loans as a vote of confidence that we’re good for it, we’re worth the diversion of resources, because in the end it’s our payments back into the pot that are reissued out to the next students. Have you made professional promises? Are you thinking about what promises to make? Have you revised your promises as you’ve gained more perspective—what have your promises become?