Ivy League phenom juggles medical, law schools at the same time

WILMINGTON, N.C. (WECT/Gray News) - After graduating from Harvard, a North Carolina man continues to prove he’s an academic anomaly. He’s now enrolled at the University of Michigan’s medical school and Yale’s law school—at the same time!

Victor Agbafe is back in his hometown of Wilmington, North Carolina, for a few weeks studying for his USMLE-Step 2-CK board exams, which focus on how well students can diagnose illnesses and complete other tasks.

Over the summer, he’ll head to Yale in New Haven, Connecticut, to begin law school. He’ll return to the University of Michigan in the summer of 2026 to finish his last year in medical school.

“Merging the language of medicine and law is key to sort of the broader impact I wanna make,” Agbafe said. “Which is advocating for better access to health care for the underserved and more affordable health care for people in general.”

Agbafe told WECT he’s really looking forward to spending the next three years at Yale.

“I chose Yale over acceptances from Harvard, Columbia, Georgetown, Duke and other law schools,” he said.

Juggling medical school and law school has not been easy. He says it has been a tough few years but credits his success to his passion for the subjects and mentors who have helped him along the way.

He says he fully intends to use both degrees.

“I want to blend a mix of surgery, sort of in the daily flow. I’m really interested in cancer care and how you can resect tumors but then, also, the reconstruction aspect of things,” he said. “I wanna also be involved in health care policy and making sure that people have affordable health care and access to care and making sure that prescription drugs are affordable.”

Agbafe isn’t the first to study medicine in the family; his mother is a doctor, and his brother recently took his MCAT exam. He believes his younger sister will also go to medical school.

In 2015, as a senior at Cape Fear Academy, Agbafe was accepted to all eight Ivy League schools. He graduated from Harvard in 2019.

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