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I am having a Difficult time finding information on the web or even through school financial aid websites on this issue. Hopefully someone here can enlighten me because I am going crazy.

This is the story. I am in my early 30’s with a mortgage and a family to support. Everyone always talks about ranking. Well where I am at in Chicago, the only schools that offer part time are Loyola, John Marshall, Chicago-Kent and Depaul.

My interests are not particularly in BigLaw but I would like to be more employable and obviously having graduated from a law school such as Northwestern will help. Unfortunately, NW does NOT offer part-time. I would have to quit working. (My spouse is unable to work and daycare costs would be enormous) How does the cost of living loans work for older adults who have mortgages and families and are not young 20somethings with no dependents? I feel for people like me, there is no way to attend a T1 university if I want to stay in Chicago, which I do since uprooting everyone would be too burdensome and costly to go somewhere like DC where Georgetown DOES have a PART TIME program. Thank you all for your input

You should reach out to financial aid departments at schools you're interested in (like Northwestern). I believe that COL loans can be increased for situations like yours.

I'll PM you.

soon2blawyer wrote: .

I don't know if you would be able to do full time and survive without a salary, but I just wanted to give you a heads up if you're already not aware: Northwestern has a full ride early decision program, which may solve your problem. I would try to talk with their financial aid office about it, but if you're able to borrow on top of the full ride, this may work for you.

Loans are usually capped at the cost of attendance, so even if you have a full ride, you can only borrow up to what the school says it costs to attend (so you can't stack loans on top of the full ride). You would need to talk to the school about adjusting the cost of attendance based on your additional responsibilities. I'm pretty sure if you have dependents you can get your COA increased to be able to borrow enough, although I'm not sure that they'd automatically increase to cover all your mortgage if it's significantly more than what they calculate for housing costs. As said above, you'd need to talk to the individual school.

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yeah, as I said "I don't know if you could survive without a salary." maybe he can get deferment in his mortgage. maybe he can work part time. i think there are things he could try, some which might be risky and some which might make life very unpleasant for the time being. i was just saying that at least NW has that thing that could make his Chicago Prestige Dreams come true.

Thank you all who responded! It truly did inform me on an area I had found very little information on.
I can honestly say I have a more thorough understanding in what my options are.. I wish Id been able to do this sooner before I had "real " obligations but it is what it is and I need to be realistic.
So thanks for all the valuable advice!

Not sure if this is really helpful, but I think it's at least relevant, so I'll add my experience to the mix. I started law school at UIUC in my early 30s (just graduated in May) with two little kids and a wife who stayed home. It is true that you will only receive the COL loans and no more, regardless of whether you have dependents or not. At UIUC it was about 20k per year my third year. I had a full ride and ended up with about 70k in loans at the end. 1L year, we basically lived off of my loans, after which I was able to work as a law clerk/summer associate during the summer and 2L and 3L years, which helped supplement our income a lot.
I know you have a mortgage, but if you really want to go law school with kids and a wife at home and can sell the house, it's doable, especially in a low-cost town like Champaign. We rented a 3 bedroom house for $825/month.
Good luck to you. I don't regret going to law school and firmly believe I was able to perform pretty successfully (top 25%) because of my family, rather than in spite of all the distractions at home. It helps you keep perspective and stay outside of the law school bubble and stress that comes with it.

fallingup77 wrote:Not sure if this is really helpful, but I think it's at least relevant, so I'll add my experience to the mix. I started law school at UIUC in my early 30s (just graduated in May) with two little kids and a wife who stayed home. It is true that you will only receive the COL loans and no more, regardless of whether you have dependents or not.

That's strange - I had no problem at UVA getting COL adjustments to cover the full cost of childcare and actual medical expenses.

Yeah, I had classmates with kids who had their COL adjusted.

albanach wrote:

fallingup77 wrote:Not sure if this is really helpful, but I think it's at least relevant, so I'll add my experience to the mix. I started law school at UIUC in my early 30s (just graduated in May) with two little kids and a wife who stayed home. It is true that you will only receive the COL loans and no more, regardless of whether you have dependents or not.

That's strange - I had no problem at UVA getting COL adjustments to cover the full cost of childcare and actual medical expenses.

Wow, that is strange. Before I started school, I figured I would be able to get an adjustment. I made a big stink about it with financial aid and they would not budge at all. Maybe this is school dependent? Or had something to do with having a spouse at home? Not sure. Maybe I got hosed.

fallingup77 wrote:

albanach wrote:

fallingup77 wrote:Not sure if this is really helpful, but I think it's at least relevant, so I'll add my experience to the mix. I started law school at UIUC in my early 30s (just graduated in May) with two little kids and a wife who stayed home. It is true that you will only receive the COL loans and no more, regardless of whether you have dependents or not.

That's strange - I had no problem at UVA getting COL adjustments to cover the full cost of childcare and actual medical expenses.

Wow, that is strange. Before I started school, I figured I would be able to get an adjustment. I made a big stink about it with financial aid and they would not budge at all. Maybe this is school dependent? Or had something to do with having a spouse at home? Not sure. Maybe I got hosed.

It's totally school-dependent.