Five Law schools in the United States have reached a settlement with the Department of Education. The settlement amount is $2.9 million.
The lawsuit claim was that the Department of Education improperly gave Federal student loans to students in advanced law degree programs.
Which 5 Law Schools?
Albany Law School, Atlanta’s John Marshall Law School, Brooklyn Law School, New England Law–Boston, and New York Law School. These five Law schools were giving ineligible students federal loans from the Education Department of the United States.
92 students doing their Masters in Law in the years 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, and 2022 have apparently got these federal loans. All 5 of these Law schools are called stand-alone institutions None of them are affiliated with any larger University.
Have The Schools Paid Back?
All of these schools returned their loan amounts. Three out of these five Law schools were also paying fines to the education department.
- Brooklyn Law School is paying $120,000.
- New York Law School is paying $100,000.
- New England Law—Boston is paying $25,000.
What Does The Education Department Say?
The Education Department requires that federal student loans be distributed to students in programs recognized by their designated accrediting agency, which for law schools is the American Bar Association. The ABA usually gives accreditation to the JD programs and not the LLM programs.
As we have mentioned above, these 5 stand-alone schools are not part of larger universities. The school’s accreditation is beyond the purview of the American Bar Association. Therefore, they will need to get additional accreditation for federal loans to students getting their LL.M. degrees.
What Are The Main Pointers Of The Settlement?
The settlement calls for reimbursing the Education Department. It also asks schools and other educational bodies to stop giving out federal loans to students who are ineligible.
Students getting their degrees from non-eligible programs are also disqualified under this scheme.
Apart from this, the settlement does not ask the schools to admit any wrongdoing. The fines and reimbursements seem to be all of it.
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