Ep 84: I Am A Single Parent. Can I Go To Law School?
Yes, you can go to law school if you're a single parent! Today, Alice is here to reassure you and share some tips on all aspects of the law school journey from applications to school environments for single parents. Being a single parent does not preclude you from this path.
Episode Highlights
The very first thing to think about as you are starting this journey is “Why?” Why are you doing this? At some point in time, whether it is during the application process or after you have started school, you will likely get overwhelmed. If you can keep that “why” at the top of your mind when things get overwhelming, when you are tired, or when you are stressed, then you are absolutely capable of doing it.
Time
Budget your time well. Law school takes time. So does parenting. There is no way around law school being time consuming. If you are coming into law school and your child is a little older these time constraints may be different.
Standard advice for the LSAT, for example, is three hours a day for three months. And that's just one piece of your law school application. When we work with students the quickest, we typically run through putting an application together is six or eight weeks. It is not out of the ordinary for it to take ten. And that's doing anywhere from four to five hours of work probably each week.
Fortunately, you can stretch that timeline out if you don't have three hours a day for a few months to dedicate to the LSAT. Stretch your timeline out, add a month or three.
Once you have a good idea of how much time you can give, you can plan some cushion times for those things that you can't really plan. For example, if your child gets sick and possibly passes it onto you, you can rest easy knowing you built in time into your schedule and not affecting your timeline.
If you realize that there isn't a feasible way for you to come to school full-time, that's okay. Plenty of law schools have a variety of part-time or evening programs. There are some that offer hybrid programs, and you have options for how often you are in class.
Resources
Find the people that support you. The people that are not only going to help take care of your kid, but they also will take care of you. Find the person that's gonna drop by in the afternoon to play with your kids so you can read for class or take an LSAT practice, test.
Look for those technical and logistical resources. What are the things that you have access to that can make this process easier? For example, as you are researching law schools, does the campus have childcare? Are there resources specifically for students who are also parent? Are the faculty and staff willing to be flexible if for whatever reason you may need to bring a kid to class?
Find other students like you while you're working on your application. There are 800,000 different social media groups, Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, and Instagram groups. See if there are other people in your area that are in a similar situation. They will be able to understand the situation that you're in, understand the things that you are feeling, the challenges that you are facing.
Tweetable Quotes
“...as a single parent, you can absolutely attend law school. You can be successful in the application process...You can go on to get a fabulous attorney’s job if that is what you’re looking for. Having to also take care of a small human does not preclude you from any of this...”