At his lowest point, Michigan Law gave John Boyles, ’59, a lifeline. In gratitude, Boyles and his wife, Janet, do the same for today’s students.
Through the John DuVall Boyles Scholarship, which John and Janet originally endowed as a discretionary fund in 1986, students can make their dream of attending Michigan Law a reality and can pursue their career aspirations with less worry about repaying loans. The couple believes that alleviating debt creates better lawyers and eases brain drain from smaller markets.
“I don’t want all of our graduates to head to big firms in big cities in order to pay their loans,” says John, who spent his career in Grand Rapids, Michigan. “After five years of working nonstop in big law, many graduates lose their enthusiasm for the profession. I want young lawyers to go wherever they’ll be happiest.”
For the current Boyles Scholars, 3L Joseph Flynn and 2L Marc McKenna, just being at Michigan Law was a huge dream.
Flynn, from Pawtucket, Rhode Island, is a first-generation college student who fled the drug violence of Colombia when he was nine. He worked full time as an undergrad, taking classes at night, and figured law school would be the same. “I saw Michigan as a school I would love to go to but would never have the chance to attend.”
Now Flynn is an associate editor of the Michigan Journal of Race & Law and president of the Michigan Immigration and Labor Law Association.
After graduation, he’ll return home to private practice, intent on serving his state’s burgeoning Latino population.
“When I was a kid, I always jumped in to defend people in trouble,” he says. “My mother joked I would be a lawyer someday, but given my background, I don’t think she ever really thought it would be possible.”
McKenna, from East Lansing, Michigan, was motivated to attend law school by the 2008 financial crisis, and he recently interned at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau in San Francisco.
“Banks and corporations find gaps in our regulatory system; I want to fill those gaps so ordinary people aren’t victimized,” he says. McKenna grew up below the poverty line; as a seventh grader, he quit school when his parents divorced. He taught himself by reading classic literature at his grandmother’s house and tinkering on computers in Michigan State’s labs. Eventually, he passed the GED and served in the Coast Guard before graduating from MSU’s honors college.
“I fell through the cracks,” McKenna says, “but thanks to Mr. and Mrs. Boyles, I am realizing an opportunity that’s usually not available to people like me.”
As a law student, John Boyles endured his own hardship.
The first year was so brutal, he almost quit. But as he settled into his 2L year, his father committed suicide—just six weeks after John married Janet. Boyles was stuck between his legal studies, and a sense of obligation to support his family and keep his father’s Grand Rapids restaurant operating.
Thanks to Roy Proffitt, ’48, LLM ’56, then assistant dean, the two paths weren’t mutually exclusive.
Proffitt helped Boyles schedule classes three days a week (plus two summers) so he could work also. He later joined a small firm that provided flexibility to run his business—which grew into 17 Mr. Fables restaurants around west Michigan. Throughout, Boyles practiced law and returned to doing so full time after selling the franchise in 1988. “A lot of businessmen appreciated that their lawyer knew how to run a business and understood their problems firsthand,” he says.
Despite the success, John and Janet never forgot the flexibility that helped make it possible. “We made up our mind that we were going to do what we could to pay back Michigan,” John says. “Dean Proffitt changed my life because he enabled me to graduate.”
The original fund in Proffitt’s honor was established with $50,000; the value of the scholarship fund now exceeds $400,000. “We feel extraordinarily lucky to have received a tremendous public education at a low cost, and we want others to have the same opportunity,” adds Janet, who, like John, attended Michigan as an undergrad. The couple also has made generous gifts to the School of Nursing, Athletics, and the Law School’s building project.
And they delight in getting to know the Boyles Scholars. “They don’t just write a check; they really care about their recipients,” says Flynn. “They demonstrate the collegiality that defines Michigan because, years after graduation, Mr. Boyles is still the quintessential Michigan Man. I hope I can help someone in the future the way they’ve helped me.”
