Breaking Barriers: The Real Cost of Law School for Immigrant and First-Generation Students

For many aspiring attorneys, law school represents a pathway to opportunity, stability, and service. For immigrant and first-generation students, however, that path is often obstructed by financial barriers that go far beyond tuition alone. As the cost of legal education continues to rise nationwide, the burden falls most heavily on those without generational wealth, established professional networks, or access to traditional sources of financial support.

Today, average annual tuition at private law schools exceeds $55,000, with many top institutions surpassing $70,000 per year. When housing, books, bar preparation, and basic living expenses are included, the total cost of attendance frequently approaches — and in so

me cities exceeds — $90,000 annually. In major legal markets such as Chicago, where rent and transportation costs continue to climb, students can easily graduate with well over $200,000 in debt.

For first-generation law students, this financial reality is compounded by the absence of family resources or institutional knowledge about navigating loans, scholarships, and clerkship pipelines. Many work multiple jobs during the academic year, limiting time for law review, moot court, externships, and networking — experiences that often determine long-term career trajectories. The result is not merely financial stress, but a structural disadvantage within a profession that already struggles with socioeconomic and racial diversity.

Immigrant students, particularly those who are DACA recipients or from mixed-status families, face even steeper challenges. Federal financial aid, including Direct Loans and work-study programs, is unavailable to many of them. Private loans, when accessible at all, often come with higher interest rates and the requirement of U.S.-citizen co-signers. For these students, the question is not simply how to manage debt, but whether law school is financially possible at all.

In Chicago and across the country, many such students carry responsibilities that extend beyond themselves — supporting parents, contributing to household income, or sending money abroad. These obligations, combined with tuition inflation and limited aid options, place extraordinary pressure on students who are otherwise among the most driven and service-oriented in the legal community.

Yet their presence in the profession is critically important. Immigrant and first-generation attorneys bring linguistic access, cultural competence, and lived experience that strengthen advocacy, improve client trust, and enhance the legitimacy of the justice system itself. A legal profession that fails to support these students risks losing voices uniquely equipped to serve underserved communities.

This is where mission-driven organizations play a transformative role. By providing targeted scholarships, mentorship, and professional guidance, the David Mebuke Foundation helps bridge the gap between talent and opportunity. Financial support alleviates the immediate burden of tuition and living costs, while mentorship offers something equally vital: access to institutional knowledge, role models, and networks that first-generation students often lack.

The story of each scholar reflects a broader truth — that the barriers to legal education are not a matter of ability, but of access. When financial constraints determine who can afford to pursue a legal career, the profession risks narrowing rather than broadening its perspective.

Supporting immigrant and first-generation law students is not only an act of equity; it is an investment in the future of the legal system. Through scholarships, mentorship, and community engagement, the David Mebuke Foundation honors the belief that talent is universal, even when opportunity is not — and that the doors to the courtroom should be open to all who have the dedication to walk through them.

Dan T. Wade

Board Member, David Mebuke Foundation