NIU Law School Lowers Out-of-State Tuition to In-State Rate

As law school admissions decline and the job market for attorneys shrinks, some law schools have been forced to shut their doors. In June 2017, Whittier Law School in California announced it would shut down this spring (https://usat.ly/2t2aGCc). Closer to home, Valparaiso University's law school stopped admitting new students this year (http://bit.ly/2FHFr5i).

How can law schools combat this trend? Northern Illinois University College of Law has decided to sweeten its value proposition by lowering the tuition for out-of-state students. As the ABA Journal reported recently, out-of-staters will pay what in-state students pay (http://bit.ly/2BUkfdJ). NIU is already charging the same tuition for in- and out-of-state students at its graduate and undergraduate schools.

Mark Cordes, the interim dean of NIU's College of Law, says that the school's applicant pool already has increased over the last two years. The move to eliminate out of state tuition should accelerate this trend, he says. Find out more in the April Illinois Bar Journal.