What’s Going On in the Admissions Cycle Right Now?
As the first shoots break out of the ground and the leaves begin to unfurl on the trees, many admissions officers are using their school’s spring break to read applications and go over last-minute plans for upcoming visit admitted student visit programs. This is also the time of year when some important information begins to become available – updated cost of attendance figures! While students typically are more excited about scholarship possibilities (ie, “Yes, free money! Please and thank you!”), a complete sense of your potential budget can only come into view when you take a look at the entire picture.
Let’s start with the basics. Per regulations from the U.S. Department of Education, every college and university that receives federal funding (which is all of them other than a select few libertarian-leaning campuses) has to publish a maximum total cost of attendance. This budget includes a few fixed costs – things like tuition and fees, which will be the same for every student before any scholarship aid is applied. The budget also includes good faith estimates for matters that can vary from one student to the next – books, travel, room and board, and personal expenses. Schools are required to prominently post this budget on their website per requirements from the both Department of Education and the American Bar Association.
Why do schools publish this budget other than “they’re required to”? First – and probably most obvious – is that they want to give students a heads-up about what their actual total costs may be. There’s a lot that can go into your budget beyond just tuition and fees and these can vary drastically from one school to the next – especially living expenses. Second, grad students can use federal loans to completely finance their legal education. However, to ensure that students don’t unnecessarily over-borrow (or “purposefully” in order to commit loan fraud!) the Department of Education needs a cap on how much a student can borrow using Grad and Grad Plus loans. That cap is this “total cost of attendance” budget.
To give you a sense of what this budget may look like, let’s check out what Harvard Law publishes (and a warning for those drinking anything right now, be sure not to take a sip before you look at the total figure – we don’t want any spit takes!):
After you clean that coffee off of your screen despite my warnings, let’s unpack a few things!
- This is only a budget for nine months. What about those three months over the summer? Well, you’re going to be working and the Fin Aid officers don’t know where you’ll be. As such, they can’t give you a budget. And you’ll hopefully be earning some money for that work so the whole “using federal loans to finance your lifestyle” thing could be a moot point.
- HLS has a mandatory student health fee. Although you haven’t taken Contracts yet, “mandatory” means “required.” On the other hand, they also note $4,080 for student health insurance. You can delete that line item from your budget if you’re going to be covered by someone else’s insurance plan (like a spouse or a parent). This is an example of how budgets can vary from one student to the next.
- On that note, this is meant to be a maximum budget. It can vary a great deal. For example, a student who has family in Boston who is willing to house them is going to spend far less in rent. Put another way, don’t feel like you should borrow money just because you can borrow money.
- Last but not least (and most germane to our discussion today), note that this is the budget for the 2022-23 academic year, ie, this year. HLS hasn’t yet published their updated figures for the coming year.
That last point is key, both for understanding your upcoming costs as well as for negotiating scholarships. Regarding the former topic, schools are in the process of updating their figures. For example, Georgetown Law has already published their budget for the coming year. Notre Dame Law has their 2022-23 figures on the Law School’s website … but the updated figures on their University’s Fin Aid office website. And regarding the latter topic, one of the biggest negotiating faux pas you can commit is to tell School A that School B has a much lower cost of attendance without noticing that School A has already updated their figures for the coming year while School B still has their current year figures published. This is the law school negotiation equivalent of having spinach caught in your teeth – don’t be that person!
So as your deposit deadlines approach, be sure that you know this budget for the coming year. If one of your top options doesn’t have it listed on their website and if you can find it using the tried-and-true Google search formula of “[law school name] cost of attendance,” contact the admissions office. Ask them if the 2023-24 budget is set. If it isn’t, ask them when they plan to publish it and also what have been the most recent increases in tuition. This is basic consumer information that they’re obliged to provide! And now that you know this, remember that:
