If you're interested in public interest law, but you're like me and you don't exactly have a burning desire to be poor all your life...check out this loan forgiveness program for college graduates who choose to serve in the public sector. If you read it thoroughly you'll see that it's not exactly the best deal ever (that whole 10 year wait is kind of a drag) but at least its a start because these types of plans rarely exist for JD programs--at least not compared to other programs like Pharmacy, Teaching, or Nursing. The whole argument is that loan forgiveness is federally granted to those programs where there is a serious shortage of qualified professionals like the aforementioned three. However, it is a fact that public interest law is reprehensibly under served and poor people are often shortchanged and neglected because of that fact. True enough, tier 1, top ten law schools do have plenty of endowment funds for in house loan forgiveness programs--but the majority of us do not attend those schools. What would be most helpful is if our illustrious current President (only for a little while longer...thank GOD!) would just put his John Hancock on the John R. Justice Prosecutors and Defenders Incentive Act.
My son is starting pre-pharmacy (pre-PharmD) classes this fall and you wouldn't believe the amount of loan forgiveness programs there are for him. He is virtually guaranteed a free ride if he keeps his grades up to par (this shouldn't be a problem because he knows that the only other alternative is me living up to my promise to make him disappear if he doesn't do well). In any event, I don't actually think this new loan forgiveness program will be enough to pull me into public interest law as a main focus, but it's enough to make me give it a little more thought. Ok, enough of my ramblings...check it out the details here:
House Education & Labor Committee
National Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators
Whitehouse Release
Check out this Video of Speaker Pelosi, & Senator Kennedy introducing the CCA:
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