Wayne State law school to freeze tuition

Wayne State University's Law School will freeze tuition and offer every incoming student a scholarship in a move designed to make a law degree more affordable while boosting enrollment.

In total, the tuition freeze and additional scholarships will amount to a 14% tuition cut for all incoming students, the school will announce this morning.

"For us, it is really important to ensure that everyone has access to quality legal education," law school Dean Jocelyn Benson told the Free Press in an exclusive interview. "Not only do we want to make sure everyone has access to legal education, but also help with the rising student debt."

The move will keep annual tuition costs at $28,138 through at least the 2015-16 school year. By comparison, the University of Michigan law school costs $25,490 per semester.

Wayne's law school will also offer nearly $1 million in new scholarship money to its current students and a minimum $4,000 annual scholarship to all incoming students.

The scholarships will be a mixture of both merit-based and need-based aid, Benson said. The scholarships are being paid for by private donations – largely from alumni, Benson said.

The hope is that by keeping the price down, students will be able to do more internships and not have to work full-time jobs while going to school, Benson said.

It's also important that students leave law school without huge debt, Benson said.

"We want them to make these decisions (about where to work after graduation) without concerns about how much they have to pay back," she said.

Wayne law graduates have average federal direct loans of $44,398. That rises to $61,020 when graduate PLUS loans are added in.

Wayne State junior Eric Lloyd, 22, of Detroit, likes the idea of a tuition freeze. He's a business major, but is considering law school.

"It's so expensive to go to law school and if you go, you almost have to get a corporate job to pay off all that debt," he said while studying on Wayne State's campus Monday. "Anything to hold down cost is good."

Wayne Law is ranked in the top 100 – at No. 87 – in U.S. News and World Report's list of Best Law Schools for 2015.

While officials said the move was about affordability, they school could also use some growth in enrollment. There were 419 students in the law school this fall, down from 484 students the previous year.

Enrollment is down at law schools throughout the country and is impacting schools in Michigan. Earlier this month, Cooley Law School announced it was shutting its Ann Arbor campus at the end of the year. Cooley's enrollment exploded during the 2000s, peaking in 2010 at 3,931. It dropped more than 40% to 2,334 in 2013-14.

Contact David Jesse: 313-222-8851 or djesse@freepress.com. Follow him on Tiwtter: @reporterdavidJ