May 192011
The University of Minnesota Law School, my alma mater, is weaning itself off all state funding over the next few years. Noting the steady decline in state support for higher education, the Law School’s administators have decided to prepare for a future when the school’s funding will come only from tuition and private donors. If we assume that state coffers aren’t going to be flush anytime soon (a relatively safe assumption), this move makes a certain amount of sense. The U can direct scarce financial resources to undergraduate programs that serve a far greater number of students. And the Law School can rest assured that its all-important U.S. News ranking won’t be adversely affected by the caprices of state legislators.
But such a move may also make a legal education less affordable. Public law schools were once the best hope of low and middle-income students who wanted a professional degree. Of course, tuition at both public and private law schools has been skyrocketing for the past decade, so the absence of state funding might not make much of a difference in holding tuition down. But if more college grads decide that becoming an attorney isn’t worth a mountain of debt, the Law School might have to lean even harder on donors to keep its star faculty from fleeing to greener pastures. I might be able to help purchase a couple textbooks, but I hope they’re not expecting much more from me.
