Canadian Lawyer

C A N A D I A N L a w y e r 4STUDENTS AUGUST 2018 57 features 4S arina Tronin had been a law clerk at an insurance defence law firm for several years in Toronto when she decided to apply for law school. "(I) just reached the limit of what I could do in that job," she says. She wanted to do work that was more intellectually stimulating and more in line with her personal values of social justice and fairness. When she got into the University of Ottawa's law school, she applied for the Ontario Student Assistance Program and for a professional student line of credit from her bank, the CIBC. She knew she would have to go further into debt if she wanted to be a lawyer. She was still paying back debt from her undergraduate studies, and her family didn't have funds to pay for law school tuition. OSAP alone would not cover the tuition at the University of Ottawa in 2015, when it cost $17,574.99 for the first year of the common law program. It also wouldn't cover rent on the apartment she would share with a partner or other living expenses. But Tronin was willing to go into debt to meet her goals. "I was 27," she says. It was now or never. "I said I wanted to graduate by the time I'm 30 — I want to start work when I'm 30." If you want to go to law school in this country, there is a good chance you are going to pay a lot for it. e average tuition for common law programs in Canada in the 2017-2018 school year, excluding Quebec, was about $17,000. And unless you, or your parents, have the money to pay for it, you will almost certainly have to borrow money. e opportunity of becoming a lawyer can reap incredible financial, social and personal rewards. But what happens when you can't repay the cost? Law school tuition has steadily increased since professional school tuition was deregulat- ed in the late 1990s. According to Statistics Canada, between the 1995-1996 and 2001-2002 school years, average law school tuition increased 61 per cent, accounting for inflation. e increase was particularly large in Ontario, where tuition shot up 141 per cent. Since then, tuitions have risen, even at schools with relatively low tuition. McGill's tuition, while still very low compared with that of other law schools, has almost doubled since it was just more than $2,000 in 2013-2014. In the 2017-2018 school year, it cost $4,388 to attend. at's nothing compared to the most expensive law school in Canada, the University of To- ronto. In 2017-2018, a student could expect to pay $36,441 for one year's tuition — a 20.5-per- cent increase from four years ago. Let's say a single person gets into U of T's law school. ey have no dependents, no disabili- ties and they don't identify as an Indigenous person. ey make minimum wage in Ontario — so, just more than $24,000 in income a year. at person, according to the OSAP 2018-2019 aid estimator tool, would qualify for a total of $15,300 in loans and non-repayable grants for school — not even half of U of T's tuition for a single year of law school, never mind books, accommodation and other expenses. To make up the shortages, students turn to private lending. e Law Students' Society of Ontario's 2014 Just or Bust survey found that 64.4 per cent of students surveyed secured pri- vate lines of credit. Depending on the school and the bank, students can be approved for up to $150,000. Some of these lines of credits come with certain perks or competitive terms. At Scotiabank, fees are waived on credit cards offered through the bank. RBC offers students a two-year grace period to start repaying the line of credit. At TD, law students can be approved for up to $125,000. Some law schools have even suggested students procure lines of credit at specific banks. e University of Toronto law school's website notes that Scotiabank and TD Bank offer "special fi- nancial assistance" for U of T JD students. Students get a maximum of $50,000 a year through that bank — and, if they bank with Scotiabank, an extra $10,000 during articling. Shaun Aaron, who graduated from Windsor Law in 2015, believed he understood the terms of his line of credit well. But there were certain pieces he missed. e summer aer his second year, Aaron had to buy a new car to get to and from class from his home. "I bought M ISABELLE CARDINAL

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