Law school is an expensive investment in your future. More than 80 percent of law students borrow money to pay for their law degree. The average amount borrowed in law school by a 2005 graduate was $51,056 at a state-supported school and $78,763 at a private school. Many graduates will leave law school with debt exceeding $100,000 – and that is not including undergraduate debt.

Facing this reality, your first goal should be to minimize your debt load. Debt load can be calculated by looking at how the tuition and fees at a particular law school may be balanced by the availability of financial aid and employment opportunities as well as by the cost of living. Good indicators of debt load are the percentage of graduates who borrowed at least one educational loan and the average amount borrowed. This information is available in The E-Guide to Public Service at America’s Law Schools.

If you are considering a lower-paying legal career, such as in public service, you must think and plan carefully so that educational debt does not limit your ability to stay on your desired career path. You must learn about the possible financial hurdles and the many strategies for minimizing them. The E-Guide provides resource links to assist you, including the ABA Commission’s Report on Loan Repayment and Forgiveness, which provides a realistic picture of what it would be like to live with $100K in debt on a public interest salary.

Tuition cost is the starting point in assessing what your debt load may be. Tuition can vary dramatically, particularly between state-supported and private schools. Residency only affects tuition at state-supported schools; private schools have the same tuition regardless of where the student lives when applying for admission. If you are considering a state-supported school, learn the school’s residency rules. You may be able to establish residency before applying or after your first year, which will influence your financial calculations.

Tuition costs can also be spread out and offset by income earned. Part-time programs allow students to get a law degree while continuing to work, thereby reducing the amount of debt incurred.

There are two forms of financial aid that help to reduce your debt load: scholarships/grants and federal work-study. Scholarships and grants are awarded depending on the school’s policies regarding need and/or merit and do not have to be repaid. The mechanics of these awards varies from school to school. Financial aid offices can provide more information. The debt load section of The E-Guide gives you the ability to compare prospective law schools regarding the percentage of students receiving scholarships and grants, the median dollar amount received and the availability of public interest scholarships.

A growing number of schools have individual scholarships or entire programs aimed at assisting students who have a commitment to or background in public service. In evaluating a full-scale public service scholarship program, consider:

• The total amount of financial aid available;
• How competitive you will be for the number of slots available;
• The obligations you will have in exchange for the funds; and
• The non-financial benefits(s) provided, such as special career counseling services, lectures and symposia, leadership opportunities and preferential entry into selected courses.

The federal work-study program funds students to work on campus or in off-campus nonprofit agencies. Find out if your prospective law schools offer work study funds and if those funds are restricted to on-campus work or whether they can be used to fund students to work with off-campus public interest law organizations. Information on the availability of work-study money for public interest work can be found in The E-Guide in the career services section.

The importance of the availability of financial aid will vary with the amount of tuition and the cost of living, as well with the availability of a loan repayment assistance program (LRAP). The bottom line is that if you keep your debt load low, the availability of loan assistance will be less necessary to your accomplishing your career goals.

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