The economy strikes again. Harvard Law School has announced that it will be cutting back support for students doing public interest work. The cuts are in two areas. First, the school is reducing its summer public interest grants from ten weeks to eight weeks; that move is in line with similar reductions in law firm summer programs. Still, a 20% cut in what was already a fairly low summer stipend is real money. Second, the school is suspending its Public Service Initiative – a program that waives 3L tuition for students who commit to spending five years in public interest practice. To counterbalance these cuts, Dean Martha Minow announced an uptick in overall financial aid and an expansion of the loan forgiveness program.
These changes effectively move dollars from support of those with likely public interest commitment to those with certain public interest commitment: summer grants, for example, support many students who will go on to work in large firms. On the other hand, the move away from the PSI program – and towards loan forgiveness – has tax consequences. The 3L tuition waiver was presumably untaxed; loan forgiveness is presumably taxable. But the funding shift is also a move away from public interest support writ large – towards broader institutional goals. By increasing the financial aid budget, the school will be better able to attract students who meet the law school's overall admissions targets; the extra dough will help maintain diversity and high LSAT scores.
At the end of the day, however, Harvard is doing more to support public interest than most law schools. Then again, it has more resources than almost any other law school.
The full Harvard Crimson story is here. Above the Law has the emails and more here.