June 01, 2007

Love under the microscope

Married grads part of the largest class of PhDs

By Marilyn Smulders

They say married people start to look like each other, but dress like each other?

For Michael Charette and Ellen Boudreau, it was only for one special day. During spring convocation ceremonies, the couple who met and married while studying for their PhDs sported matching black gowns faced with yellow silk and velvet birretums with golden tassels.

It felt good to don the regal ensembles — Ellen added four-inch stilettos to hers — after years of rigorous thesis and lab work. Michael (BSc ’97, PhD ’07) and Ellen (BSc ’00, PhD ’07) are both pursuing post-doctoral fellowships at Yale University School of Medicine.

“It’s so much better to have someone in the trenches with you,” says the newly minted Dr. Boudreau. “They understand what you’re going through — the thesis and lab work — because they’re going through it all too.”

Others in the Boudreau clan have also discovered romance at Dalhousie.

Ellen’s brother Robert Boudreau (PhD ’06) and his fiancée Randy Lynn Newman (PhD ’04) also met while doing graduate work at Dalhousie. And before that, Ellen’s parents, Leonard Boudreau (BSc ’72) and Elaine Boudreau dated and married during their university years. (Ellen’s other brother John is also a Dal alumnus; he graduated with a BSc in 2006.)

This spring, Dalhousie graduated 53 PhD students, the largest class to date. 

 

 

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