Full-Tuition Scholarship Announcement

Anna Donovan: Welcome back to Applying Yourself, a law school admissions podcast. My name is Anna Donovan, and I am the communications program manager here at Washington University’s School of Law in St. Louis. It is just me today with our special guest. With me today is Katherine Scannell, Vice Dean of Institutional Success. Katie, we have a very exciting announcement that we just rolled out. Would you like to tell all of our listeners about it?

Katherine Scannell: I am so excited about this. And Wash U Law has always been committed to generous scholarships. I’m sure you all know that. You read the … you read Reddit. You read the blogs. Yes, the web … our website, hopefully. Don’t believe everything you read, but, you know, the stuff about WashU Law having generous scholarships, absolutely true. And we are excited to expand our commitment.

If a student is from a low-income household, a household that is below 200% of the federal poverty line, that student is guaranteed full tuition from WashU Law. Now, that’s just our minimum guarantee, but we are committed to making sure that students can afford to come to law school, making the best legal education possible, and I’m so excited that we are rolling this out.

Anna Donovan: Yeah, we are so, so excited. We are getting tons of questions, which I’m going to throw at you at a rapid pace. So, we have this opportunity, you know, and it’s on top of our already, I think, very generous and very nuanced holistic scholarship approach. But what should these prospective students who are interested do first?

Katherine Scannell: First, you have to apply.

Anna Donovan: Yes, yes, we can’t even think about it until you apply.

Katherine Scannell: We also recognize that it can be costly to go through the law school application process. And that’s why we have, for many years now, had a $0 application fee. So we hope to take that obstacle out of the way. But sometimes even applying through LSAC can still be costly. And if you need to apply completely fee-free, you can apply on our website. And that is the very first step. Apply.

Please, please apply. Put yourself in the mix. We’re really trying to remove all barriers from that. We know and we think that WashU Law can be a great fit for all people considering law school.

Anna Donovan: So Katie, so if someone applies, they get admitted, you know, that next step, how would this eligibility be determined?

Katherine Scannell: Sure. So once you are admitted to WashU Law, and this new commitment is for all of the students who are applying now and hoping to enter law school in the fall of 2023, so once you apply, you’re admitted, we will talk with you about your challenges. We’ll have a call just with you about your scholarship needs, about your background, and we will send you a couple forms that you need to fill out, financial forms.

There will be the FAFSA, and there will be a WashU Law specific form. You’ll fill those out, and then we will take that all to the scholarship committee, and they will look at everything you’ve accomplished. They will look at your challenges, they will look at your household income, and they’ll put together a fantastic scholarship package for you.

Anna Donovan: Absolutely. And I know you say we, but can you talk a little bit about kind of maybe who is doing the determination and how great our financial aid office is?

Katherine Scannell: Our financial aid office is fantastic. When I say we, I refer to WashU Law as a whole, but there is a scholarship committee, and we work closely with our director of financial aid. Our director of financial aid will look at all of the financial information you’ve provided, determine if we need additional information, and then let the committee know if you qualify for this great new program.

Anna Donovan: Yeah. So this is obviously very specific to some low-income households, but our historical scholarship awards, our current 1L class, 100% of them received some sort of scholarship award, and need gets rolled into that for them. But could you talk maybe a little bit more about what our customized scholarships, kind of maybe some details of what those look like for this year?

Katherine Scannell: Absolutely. And actually, I’d like to kind of talk a little bit more about, before I jump into what the customized scholarships look like, I’d love to just kind of piggyback off what you said. You know, you may not qualify for for, you know, you may not come from a household that is below 200% of the federal poverty line, which is $55,500 for a family of four right now, but we are still looking at, you know, students from low-income households and the perspectives they bring, the value they bring to our community, and really looking to make law school affordable for them.

So I know you said this, but I just wanted to reiterate that you don’t have to meet that baseline, I’ll call it. That is really the minimum. Like we are going to guarantee that. But you are likely eligible for an incredibly strong scholarship if you are from a low-income household, even if it doesn’t meet that classification.

Anna Donovan: Yes. And I think also interjecting here a little bit, the need and merit components. You know, I know when you’re looking and we’re talking specifically about Wash U Law, but when you’re looking at all these other schools and how they do scholarships, you know, sometimes you just see merit, sometimes you just see need, you know. And for us, the combination of our, you know, holistic review for need and merit-based scholarships.

Katherine Scannell: Yes. And you’re being admitted to WashU Law because you bring so much in so many ways to our community and we are confident that you are going to be a great part of our community and elevate the classroom discussion and add so much. So we are going to give you merit-based financial awards and need-based as appropriate, and we’ll roll that all together, and…

And then we’re going to look at your specific challenges. Maybe you have children, and you need support with childcare, or maybe you’re worried about your writing skills, and you need support with writing. We are gonna have a one-on-one call with you to talk about your challenges, your goals, you know, everything that you’re bringing and how we can design a scholarship for you.

And every one of our students coming in in the fall of 2023 will have a customized scholarship.

Anna Donovan: Yeah, we are starting to roll those out. It is very fun to get those out into the world and see the excitement around those, and also, you know, for some of our admitted students who may qualify for these low-income household full-tuition scholarships.

We can maybe wrap it there, but as always, you know, with any questions, please reach out to our office. We can be reached via email. You could find our contact information on our law school website. We have, you know, email us, call us, and we have a ton of, you know, touchpoints both in person but also virtual consultations with admissions, but also current students.

You know, again, touching back, we can’t determine your eligibility for these, but talking through, you know, how WashU Law might be a great fit, how your background and experiences can bring great perspective potentially to our class, and encouraging everyone to submit an application to WashU Law. Any last words, Katie?

Katherine Scannell: Yeah, if you are at all wondering if you’re eligible for this program, you are likely eligible for some really strong scholarship at WashU Law. So please, please apply. That is the only way we can move forward, and we are here to help you through the application process and then every step after that as, you know, you make your way through starting law school in the fall of 2023.

Anna Donovan: Yeah, well, thank you for joining us. I’m sure we will have you back in the future. Thank you to all of our listeners.