Nikki Laubenstein: Hello, and welcome to Status Check with Spivey. My name is Nikki Laubenstein, and I have been a consultant with the Spivey Consulting Group for eight years, and I have worked in the field of law school admissions for 26 years. Spivey has done many podcasts, but to my knowledge, none have covered the topic that we'll be tackling today: financial aid. I'm thrilled to have the opportunity to speak with two outstanding professionals in the field of financial aid; today, we have Kristin Shea and Sydney Montgomery with us. Welcome and thank you both.
Kristin is the Director of Graduate and Law Financial Aid at Syracuse University College of Law, where she's worked for almost 20 years. She has served in various roles, including five years in the development office, and she has spent 14 years in a financial aid capacity. Lucky for me that I had the pleasure of working alongside Kristin for many of those years, and I can tell you that she's a true professional.
And Sydney is the Executive Director and Founder of Barrier Breakers, which is an education nonprofit with a mission to increase access to and success in higher education for first-generation students and others with barriers to entry. Sydney is a nationally recognized champion for upward mobility in first-generation students as a TEDx speaker, Obama USA leader, and Forbes 30 Under 30 honoree. We so appreciate Sydney joining us today to share her incredible knowledge and expertise also.
So with that, can each of you say anything more you'd like to add about your backgrounds, your current roles, and maybe a little bit about what got you into the field of admissions and financial aid? Kristin, you want to start?
[2:04] Kristin Shea: Sure! Well, I've spent two decades in higher education, and I'll say that, certainly, supporting students and being able to advocate for students is really what brought me to higher education and what keeps me in higher education. My current role, I am the Director of Financial Aid at the College of Law, and then also, as you mentioned, work with graduate students and work with the main campus financial aid office. I'm in charge of more of the administrative side of making financial aid available to graduate and law students, but I do meet with students, and I'm looking forward to supporting students with the changes that we have ahead for the '26/'27 year and the opportunity that provides to work with colleagues, and to be here today with Sydney and with you, and really talk through some of the challenges ahead and what the opportunities are.
Nikki: Great; thank you, Kristin. Sydney, would you like to add anything more about your background? What got you into the field?
Sydney Montgomery: Absolutely. So I'm from Maryland. I'm a proud Marylander. My mom's a Jamaican immigrant. My dad's from the south side of Chicago. Both my parents were in the military, and I like to say that I fell into admissions work accidentally, but it was also really financial aid that I became really passionate about. My parents did not know anything about applying to college in the U.S. or how to even go about that. My dad got his degree online through the military, and my mom started community college after she had left the military. And so, I was kind of on my own. I didn't know anything about the cost of college. I applied to schools based off of Gilmore Girls because I was obsessed, and I did not look at, you know, how much schools cost or anything like that.
Nikki: A great reason.
[3:43] Sydney: It was a great reason. Great reason. Connecticut, great state. Did not end up going to school in Connecticut. But I had a teacher that really took an interest in me. I became the first student from my high school to go to Princeton, and I did not think, one, that a person from my background could ever afford Princeton. I thought it was a school that was, you know, mainly for people that were wealthy. But then, when I realized and started learning more about financial aid, and I actually negotiated my own financial aid—I didn't know that's what I was doing, but I did that on my own, because it wasn't enough. My parents were not able to contribute.
I realized that there were a lot of other students who weren't applying to schools because of this assumption that things were unaffordable. At the time, actually, Princeton cost less than it would've for me to go in-state to Maryland, though. And so there are so many misconceptions and things about financial aid and demonstrated need. And, you know, especially when we get to the law school space, that there are a lot of nuances in teaching students how to advocate for themselves, teaching students to understand financial literacy.
I didn't know anything about my loans. You know, I worked three jobs in college. I worked three jobs in law school. I learned a lot about financial literacy kind of the hard way. And so I'm really, really passionate about helping students navigate this path and to know that where you go to school really does change your life. Princeton changed my life, Harvard Law School changed my life, and I'm so thankful that we're able to do that for so many students today.
[5:07] Nikki: That's wonderful. Thank you both so much for that extra information; I appreciate it.
Okay, so with that, let's get started on our, as I said, big topic today that is financial aid. Because there's a lot that we could cover and lot we could talk about, I'd just like to start with a little summary of what we plan to cover in today's podcast. The overview of what financial aid includes is kind of how we'll start. Then we'd like to talk about, as we mentioned earlier, there's some changes to loans and to repayment plans with the new legislation, and that will affect the fall 2026 applicants, so we'd like to dig into that a little bit more so everyone has an understanding of what's changing, what's in store, and can be as prepared as possible for that. And we also plan to touch on some of those questions and concerns from various populations that we all work with.
To be clear, we're not planning to cover merit aid in much depth or the process of appealing for merit scholarships in this podcast. Spivey Consulting and other resources—a lot of resources on that topic. But today, the plan will be to go into more of the other forms of financial aid that the majority of students use to fill that gap between merit aid and the overall cost of attendance for the school that you plan to attend. And I think a little bit later we'll be covering more details about what is all included in a school's cost of attendance as well.
So when we talk about financial aid, the main types are merit aid, need-based grants, and self-help aid, so that would include work-study jobs and loans. In general, for law students, there tends to be a heavier reliance on the merit- versus the need-based aid. And I think this differs quite a bit from undergrad financial aid. Sydney's going to talk a little bit about some more of those differences from the undergrad financial aid process, because that's where most are coming right out of or have been just a few years ago before starting professional careers, and kind of the process that they're aware of.
[7:13] So, I think it might be helpful to think about what, from the law school side, it means to build a class. When I worked in an admissions office, I oversaw enrollment management for the office, and there are a lot of factors that go into building a class each year. Usually, the dean, the CFO, the enrollment management dean, and the financial aid director get together at the start of the cycle. They lay out a plan for the goals that they have in mind and the targets that are required to hit for developing the strategy around meeting those goals. I don't know that most applicants think about that from the admissions and financial aid side of things or, you know, all that goes into hitting those targets or the pressures around that from law school administrations and central administrations. But they're worried about how are they going to pay for their own law school education.
So when the admissions deans are tasked with these many factors, a lot of it is building a class around selectivity measures. So as everybody is aware, they're looking for test scores, GPAs, admit rates, and yield, but they also have to hit a net tuition revenue goal each year. And this net tuition revenue is the actual amount of money in tuition and fees that the school brings in once scholarships and institutional need-based financial aid and other discounts are deducted from their overall tuition price.
So applicants, of course, don't know what every law school has for those goals going into the cycle, but they can assume in general that schools want to maintain or increase their LSAT and GPA medians, and they want to bring in a diverse class, in whatever ways that the school defines that. They want to enroll interesting students with demonstrated experiences who will be employable, and they want to end with a high yield on their class, meaning they want to enroll applicants who really want to be there and who will make for proud alumni.
With all of that in mind, beyond the merit scholarship piece, I'd love to now get into discussing what the other financial aid looks like. So, Kristin, if I can ask you next to tell us a little more about what has changed for this coming, entering class—so those applicants applying this current cycle for fall 2026, entering students. We understand that some of our listeners who are applying this year may not know how things used to be, so they may not really understand what's changed. But Kristin's going to break that down a little bit more for us.
[9:53] Kristin: They could borrow up to $138,500 for direct subsidized and unsubsidized loans, and that included undergraduate and graduate and professional loans. Now, under the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, there's distinct amounts of loans that students can borrow. So in addition to undergraduate loans, students now have a graduate loan limit of up to $100,000 and then $200,000 for professional loans. If students are attending a graduate program and pursuing a master's degree prior to coming to law school, now they're going to have to factor in, have they used a part of that professional loan limit as a graduate student? So it's changing the way that we're approaching these aggregate totals from how we've had to until now.
Nikki: Perfect, okay, thank you so much for that clarification. So there's a lot going on, and it sounds like there's a lot to understand. I'd love to hear more from both of you, actually, about how you see some of these things as maybe positives and any concerns or challenges that you see with these changes. Sydney, can you tell me more about what you see as positives and concerns on these changes?
[11:11] Sydney: Yes. Although I'll say, I think the students we work with at Barrier Breakers see fewer positives. But I will say that there have been some students that are happy about the increase in the unsubsidized loan limit getting increased, because there are students that could have taken more than that $20,500. And so getting that increase to $50,000 is really helpful for some students. So I would say that could be a positive, and I have had a student have that factored into their decision. And so I think that is something on the positive side that I've heard from my students.
I think the biggest concern is that $50,000 cap on federal loans, and I know we'll probably dive into it a little bit more deeply, but there are many students that are not able to access private funding, because they don't have a cosigner or they don't have good credit. And there are a vast number of law schools that do not give need-based aid. And so, if you are a student who is getting into your kind of reach school, where maybe you're not going to get as much merit aid, and they're not giving need-based grants, and previously you would've said, "Well, for this reach school, I will just borrow it," and you now only have $50,000, which is not going to go super far—you might find yourself not able to go if you cannot access private funding. And I think we're really going to see a divide in this country between people that can access private loans and those that can't.
And I think that's the thing that keeps a lot of my students up at night. It is also something that factors into whether or not they think about early decision, which, again, has always been a little problematic for those that have financial concerns, because oftentimes, unless it's a specific ED program that comes with a full-ride scholarship—and there are a number of them, in the law school space—but oftentimes you are kind of making an assumption that, "This is a school that I'm committed to going to early decision, even if they don't fund me." But there's difference between saying, "I feel comfortable taking out the full freight and loans," which, you know, we can go back and forth about whether that's actually something you should have ever thought about. But it is very different if you cannot take the loans. And if you get into this early decision binding program and you realize later, "Oh, I thought I was going to be able to, and now I can't," I think that's going to be an interesting thing to see play out in some of these ED agreements.
[13:40] Kristin: I echo your concern, Sydney, and I think about students having choice and being able to look at a wide array of law schools, and, you know, that Graduate PLUS Loan was a resource that students could count on for the parts of the equation that were in some ways beyond their control. They're finding out, you know, in the spring or summer where they're accepted to law school, what their scholarship offer is, and then they have to come up with a plan for covering remaining tuition fees, making a plan for covering their cost of living expenses, possibly in a brand new market, in a brand new place that they're going to be moving to. And the Graduate PLUS Loan offered that opportunity for students to be able to cover those costs and have that peace of mind that they have the support they need.
Now, when we're thinking about private loans, many students, just by the sheer nature of how creditors consider credit, they're not going to have a robust credit history, right? Because they just haven't had time to build that. They may or may not have a co-signer that could commit to co-signing the private loan so they'd be eligible. They not only have to think about just one year, they have to think about the duration of the program, which might be over three or four years. And so, how do we now best support students in being able to make those decisions on a tight timeline? We're working with less than a calendar year right now, with big picture problems that really require students having more time to be able to build resources, build their credit, build an understanding of how they're able to now meet this moment in a different way.
I am grateful that the professional limit did increase for students annually, but my biggest concern is, how can we best as a community support students in meeting those other costs? And really in such a small window of time this year. I am glad that in some ways, I think, we've got a tight timeline, but over the next few years, financial aid, it's one of the top reasons that students make a decision about where they're going to attend. Now there’ll be more cognizance, right, about costs. My hope is that will be earlier, that students will be looking at that earlier and that, over the years ahead, that we can better support students with this change.
[16:02] Sydney: Yeah. And I would just also add, you know, with the direct unsubsidized loan, I think that a lot of students don't realize, I didn't realize, that you don't just get the whole $20,500. Like, they kind of determine how much you can have for the unsubsidized loan. I think students don't always realize that. They're like, "Okay, I have this 20 grand," but you apply for it, you know, studentaid.gov, and they might say, you know, "You were approved for this amount," and it's not the $20,500. It could be $8,000. And I think we work with a lot of working students at Barrier Breakers who, on paper, maybe they have enough, but they might be caring for three kids or an ailing grandparent or a medical issue, or they have a mortgage or car, right? And for a lot of people, and I always like to say this out loud, credit is not a virtue. And I think that people often feel ashamed if they don't have good credit or their credit's not where they want it to be. But sometimes, oftentimes, it is just a reflection of the journey that you've gone on and maybe where you've started and the decisions you've had to make. Because when your back's up against the wall, you have to make certain decisions.
And I think that Grad PLUS Loan, I mean, as long as you didn't have any bankruptcy or default, like you've got it. And I think that's a challenging thing because, yes, there are students that need time to build credit, but it also takes so much time to repair credit. And to not be on notice that you now have to factor that into maybe your law school preparedness, if you need to be able to access private funding, there isn't a lot of time for that.
Nikki: Yes, I agree. The rushed timeline was one of my biggest concerns seeing this, and realizing, oh, that's year's applicants jumping into these changes and learning them. And I can only imagine what that means for financial aid administrators and just trying to keep up to speed on all of these things.
So thank you for sharing those perspectives. If you could add anything more that the students that you're working with have expressed as concerns about these changes, or are you getting the sense that they're not really aware yet of what's coming? Can you share more about what they're saying, if anything yet, about what they're seeing in terms of concerns over this?
[18:13] Kristin: I'm hearing from current students with concerns, and I'll say that I haven't heard from many entering students yet. And in talking with other law school administrators, similarly, they're not hearing from students just yet. And I think it's just, as we've talked about earlier in the discussion, there's so many differences between undergraduate financial aid and graduate and professional financial aid that it's not something that students maybe even have an awareness of, to ask us, to know what is it that's significant that's changed, that they need to now know, what are the right questions to ask?
And it's my hope that with some of what we're talking about today and with some of the other community efforts that are being made to start really getting information out, building awareness, that we will be able to empower students with understanding the challenges at hand and then how we can best support them in gathering the information that they need with the decision ahead.
Sydney: Yeah, I would say that we do hear from students, but I think 70% of our students at Barrier Breakers are over the age of 25. I mean, we do work with some undergrad students. We hear less of this from them. To the point, there is a lot of differences about undergraduate and graduate financial aid, which I'm happy to talk about. I would say that our working adults, though, as soon as the bill was passed, my email was flooded, and they didn't even know, I think, what questions—they're just like, "This is bad. This is bad, and I want to know how bad it is."
Nikki: Yes. Understandable. Yes.
[19:48] Sydney: And so, you know, trying to do a lot of, like, reassuring, because I think especially with a first-gen population, it can seem like just another roadblock. And specifically wanting to make sure that students know that it is okay to still have those reach schools. You know, you don't have to lower your aspirations or only look at certain schools. I mean, we have to be more cognizant and more creative, and we have to plan more, but it doesn't mean that you should lower your sights.
I know that a lot of schools, they have the loan repayment assistance programs and they have some things that may help, you still have to get the loans or finance it some way on the front end. But I know that students had those concerns, and it's understandable, because studies do show that students from lower socioeconomic backgrounds are the most benefited from going to elite universities, whether that's on the undergraduate or graduate side, in terms of upward mobility. It tends to have the biggest ripple effect on just them and their family and generations and getting access to certain networks.
And so, you know, our students are really thinking about, especially, you know, we've had students that are working two minimum wage jobs, and then they get that acceptance to a top school, and, you know, now they're making significantly more money and they're providing for their family differently. And so students just want to know that that path is still available to them.
[21:02] Nikki: And you mentioned you are well aware of a lot of the differences, because you work with undergrads and law students both. Can you, Sydney, tell us more about those main differences between the process of financial aid for undergrads versus law students?
Sydney: Absolutely. And I don't know that I like either. Some days I like one more than the other. It depends.
For undergraduate financial aid, it is really based on your parents' income, or your guardian. Sometimes, if your parents are separated, and depending on the school, that might just be the parent that you primarily live with. And that is the FAFSA form usually controls that. And then, depending on the school, they might use the College Board CSS profile to get a look at your non-custodial parent and other assets. But every school meets a certain percentage of demonstrated need, and that is actually all in a school's common data set. There are resources that compile all of that.
So you can see, I'm really interested in Sunnyside University, and they meet 89% of my demonstrated need, or they meet 100% of my demonstrated need. And that is, you know, you get a student aid index and it tells you kind of, “Your family theoretically can afford X.” And you take the cost of attendance minus what your family can theoretically afford by the index, and you get your demonstrated need, and then you can kind of estimate what your need-based financial aid will be. And there are a number of schools that only do need-based aid. Most schools do a combination, but all schools do some kind of need-based aid, which is the biggest difference, I think, between college and law schools, that the vast majority of law schools don't do any need-based aid grants. And there are a lot of students in that middle space that don't qualify for need-based aid, but then you can also see what percentage of those students get merit aid.
[22:48] Now, I will say, that places where law school financial aid shines, it is a little bit more predictable merit aid at the law school level. You know, the GPA above the median and the LSAT score above the median, you know, you can kind of do some estimations there. And, you know, you're probably not going to get any need-based aid, but you have a little bit of control over the merit aid situation.
On the undergraduate side, I think you have more insight into the need-based aid. The merit-based paradigm, it's a little bit of a black box. It's very competitive, and there's no, "Okay, I have this 1600 and I've got this 4.5, I'm going to get this full ride." Like, that doesn't happen on the undergraduate side; like, you hope and like maybe you get some, maybe you don't. And there's a lot more that goes into it. So, I think the students that have the most control—quote-unquote "control"—would be that population of students that have high need but also are top performers. And then, if you can get into a school that meets a hundred percent of your demonstrated need, you know you can basically go for free.
Whereas I would say, on the law school side, the students that have that most clarity are just the top performers, right, regardless of need, for certain schools. And you can decide, "If I really want to go for free, I can take my 180 and my 4.0 and probably go to"—I'm from Maryland, so I'm going to shout out University of Baltimore—and you know, like, “I'll probably get a really good merit scholarship because I'm going to be above their medians.” I can decide that scholarship is more important than rankings for me on the law school side. You know, if you're a student that doesn't have need as much on the undergraduate side, you can't make that decision. "I'm deciding that I'm going to get a full ride to college"—like, you don't decide that. You can hope, but that is not in your control.
[24:27] Nikki: Yes, that's such a good point, and I appreciate you bringing all of that up.
And I think let's jump up ahead a little bit to just talking about what a law school cost of attendance includes, because when I was a dean of admission, I had the fun task of reviewing all of the scholarship appeals that came my way, and I enjoyed making those—what you're talking about, Sydney—those scholarship decisions. I mean, that was great. I could make a decision to admit somebody and give them what we had determined would be that scholarship amount to try to get that student to come to our school. But then there's that other process where they're sending you the other offers from other schools to try to increase that scholarship amount.
So a lot of times, when students would try to negotiate those amounts, they wouldn't fully get that it's not just the scholarship and the tuition, it's the overall cost of attendance that you should be looking at at a school. So for a school like Syracuse, where we were in a less expensive, relatively speaking, area of the country than maybe some bigger cities, often students would come to us not really understanding the overall cost of attendance being part of that decision-making. And if whoever would like to just jump in and talk first about what all is included in a school's cost of attendance and how students should be really looking at that?
[25:51] Kristin: Sure. We publish on our website a realistic estimate of costs that students should plan for for their program of study. This includes their direct expenses, which would be their tuition and fees, those fixed costs that are going to be billed to the student, and then indirect expenses, which would be housing, food, books, supplies, course materials and equipment, transportation, a personal allowance. And then we also include an estimate of loan fees if students are using federal loans.
So this is meant to give students an idea of what they should plan for for an academic year for costs for a modest standard of living as a student. And it is something that we want students to be thinking about, because as you mentioned, those scholarship negotiations and those scholarship offers are often targeting those direct, fixed expenses, but then there's these other categories of variable expenses, and it's something that students, as they're considering the cost of living and the area that they may be wanting to relocate to for law school, these are costs that are within their control. So we're providing for students a housing budget for the nine-month academic year, and it's our hope that students would then look for housing options that would fall within that budget, right, to best manage their costs within the cost of attendance.
So it's meant to be a guide. It's something that I think many students aren't thinking about until closer to when they're going to begin the program because, you know, at the time when they're finalizing their decisions, securing housing and that really important and significant part of the budget begins to be filled in—and something that my hope is we're able to support students in looking at much earlier this year.
[27:42] Sydney: I think that I would add, not that I'm encouraging people to increase their cost of attendance, but that students should be aware that sometimes there's professional judgment in which the cost of attendance can be appealed up if they have extenuating medical circumstances or other kind of extenuating circumstances. That personal allowance, which includes like rent and food and stuff, if that doesn't quite cover what a student may need. I know I've done that for my own medical health issues, Ehlers-Danlos and fibromyalgia, and that can be very helpful. But students should, as much as possible, try to stay within the cost of attendance budget. But I always like to mention that, because I didn't learn that until I was almost done with my 1L year.
Kristin: Thank you so much for saying that, too. And think schools should publicize that we do consider special circumstances for students. It's something that we should be letting students know about. And also that, within the last few years, other areas that have been added to the cost of attendance are the cost of licensing fees, like the cost of the bar exam, childcare expenses, and also disability expenses. So these are other areas that we want students to be aware of, and that we're able to have conversations with students earlier in the process as they're considering where they might want to enroll.
[29:01] Nikki: Great. Thank you both for all of that. That's so helpful. And it kind of brings me to a next important point, I think, because you both mentioned just how much understanding the financial aid timeline is important. If students could think about financial aid as an extension of the admissions process and think about it all together at the same time, I know, as Kristin you just said, that's not typically how it works. You worry about where you're going to get in, and there's so much work involved in all of that. And then later get to the point of, "Okay, now how am I going to pay for law school?" But maybe the timeline of—well, the FAFSA opens October 1st, and starting to plot that out and think about cost as part of that initial timeline.
But I also wanted to discuss a little bit more the relationship between the admissions and financial aid office and just truly how much those financial aid officers in law schools are counselors and are there to help support you with these questions. And to use them—Sydney, like you said, "Hey, I wasn't aware of certain things as a 1L"—but maybe going and sitting down with somebody to explain it. Or a lot of times, offices will hold, as they can, financial aid trainings or information sessions. You know, go to those things and try to understand more about your personal journey in paying for school.
I think, Kristin, when you and I worked together, I loved that we had an office that we shared, an office suite, and it was great that we worked so closely together. I think some schools have that set up and others don't. You know, there are other law schools where they're not even in the same building, admissions and financial aid. So, Kristin, because you're in a financial aid capacity now, can you talk more about that relationship between the two offices, the timeline, tips for utilizing the great resources that are available in financial aid offices?
[30:57] Kristin: Sure. And to your point, law schools may be structured differently. So we're very fortunate at Syracuse that we have a blended operation. We share a physical space with admissions and financial aid; we're embedded within the College of Law. There are other law schools that may not have a separate financial aid office; it's a centralized function. My hope is that students feel encouraged to reach out to admissions and financial aid professionals, whether there is a separate financial aid office at the law school or not, to ask questions about financial aid, about scholarships, about resources, about the cost of attendance, how they can best engage with administrators at the law school. There is a very supportive law school community. And then other organizations as well—LSAC, AccessLex Institute—that offer resources and support to students. And we're here to help and talk through these questions and talk through these challenges now, so students feel that they can best connect to the resources that they need, and apply—meeting our deadlines, and applying for optimizing their resources.
Nikki: That's great, Kristin. Thank you so much. And, Sydney, I know you work so closely with your students, and you have a lot of great financial literacy type of resources for them, and you are able to refer them to great tips and resources. Are there others you'd like to add in terms of just making our students aware of what can be helpful out there?
[32:29] Sydney: Yeah, I mean, I love AccessLex. I really do. And the hill that I may die on one day is that I think that law school should be a two-year application process. You know, we get so many students that are like, it's like June, and they're like, "I'm applying. I'm just starting. I've done nothing." And that's fine. But when you look at, like, applying to college, many people start thinking about applying to college junior year. And when I work with my juniors, we spend junior year building the list. And in part of that building a list, I have all my juniors do a net price calculator. And the parents have to sign off that they saw it, the price, before we even start writing essays, before we even finalize the list. And it is more than a four-month sprint.
And I think that somehow, even though law school is more than college, it costs more than college, we do not apply the same gravitas to it. Like, we're talking about FAFSA to ninth graders. Like, we have to have this information. And then like for law school, we're like three months, you just need a three-month runway, hit submit, it's fine. We'll deal with the finances later. I wish we just dialed it back a little bit. Like, take your time. Research the schools; AccessLex has a great calculator, just like the net price calculator for undergrad, where you can estimate how much it would cost and what the loans might look like and your monthly payments.
And you can put in your budgets and like, you can do a lot of pre-planning before you even decide, "Hey, yeah, this is a school that I want to go to," or even you can make the decision, "No, I really want to go to X school, I only have this $50,000 to borrow, so if I want to try to get a good merit scholarship, then I really need to be targeting X score.” Or, “This school may, like, be a little bit on affordable with the budget that I have set." Right? And maybe even using the financial aid to influence your LSAT prep or your studying or your grades.
Like, I just think that we're not talking about it early enough. And there are so many ways that you can access every school with planning. It's not like college, where you're going to be a senior at some point. You know, we're here now. You get to decide when you go to law school; you get to decide when you're ready. And so you should go when, also, the finances, you have a good handle on what they're going to be.
[34:43] Kristin: I think that's such great advice, Sydney, and I agree wholeheartedly. And I think, you know, one of the things we talked about was the timeline. And we always tell students, you should not wait for an admissions decision to apply for financial aid. My hope for students is that, as they're looking at schools, they've got a spreadsheet where they're plotting in the cost of attendance and taking a look at, "Okay, what is this total cost going to be," that net price, estimating their scholarship. And then thinking about, what are they going to be responsible for, and how are they going to cover that?
And those are the things that I want to tell students now, and for the next year, for three years from now, right? So they're walking in with a toolkit for everything that they have to think about and consider with this huge investment that they're making, which right now is in such a short timelines.
Nikki: Yes. Thank you both for talking about all that. I think your tips for thinking about all of this earlier is one of the main takeaways I was hoping to have come out of this podcast today. So thank you for that. And with that, Kristin, because you work with current students also, and again, all these changes, if you wouldn't mind explaining, kind of high level, you know, some of those main changes and takeaways that are coming with the One Big Beautiful Bill Act for the repayment options? We talked about the loan changes, the loan caps, but can you also go into some of those changes for repayment?
[36:08] Kristin: Sure, yes. So borrowers with new federal student loans, on or after July 1st, 2026, are going to have access to a new standard repayment plan and a new repayment assistance plan, which is being referred to as RAP. The new standard plan is different than the existing standard plan for students who have borrowed loans prior to July 1st, 2026. That requires a 10-year repayment term.
The new standard repayment plan term length is going to correspond to the borrower's total loan balance. So, for example, borrowers with less than a $25,000 loan balance will have a 10-year repayment term. More than that would be tiered up to a 25-year repayment term for borrowers. And so they'd be making a fixed payment over that length of time based on what they've borrowed in total.
The new RAP repayment assistance plan is an income-driven payment plan. That's going to be based on the borrower's adjusted gross income, and there's a tiered schedule. With that plan, borrowers would have to make at least a minimum $10 payment per month, and then it's a percentage of their adjusted gross income per month.
There is an interest subsidy for that plan, so borrowers who are making those monthly payments would then have that additional unpaid interest waived, and that way we wouldn't have interest accrual, which has been a huge issue with the repayment plans. And payments under the RAP plan would also count toward public service loan forgiveness. The plan would also offer general loan forgiveness for borrowers with 360 payment plans under that.
And I will say, we've talked a bit about the new loan limits, the elimination of PLUS, and then the introduction of more private loan borrowing. Private loans aren't eligible for these repayment plan options. They're not eligible for public service loan forgiveness. So again, these are things that, as a community, we're trying to start bringing more awareness to as we're seeing a shifting of these resources. So students know, in their career planning, you know, in their planning, how to factor in those other elements as well.
[38:31] Sydney: That's such a good point. I think one of the things my students have been concerned about is, back in the day, if you knew you were going into public interest, it behooved you to use federal loans because those could qualify for public service loan forgiveness. There are schools that have their own loan repayment assistance programs, and they do work on both private and federal loans. I'm wondering if there might be more schools that think about developing their own loan repayment assistance programs with the fact that there hopefully will still be just as many students going into public interest, but those students may now have these private loans that are not eligible for public service loan forgiveness. And I'm just wondering if law schools are thinking about taking up that mantle there.
Kristin: I think they're thinking across the board. I think it is something that right now, you know, as a community, we have to be thinking about these issues, right? And how we've solved or approached them in the past. And now, how are we going to support, solve, and rise to the occasion, and continuing to support these paths into public service?
Sydney: Absolutely. I agree. I commend law schools for thinking creatively about all the different options that they might have available to them to continue to support students. I do want students to know that law schools very much care and are committed to helping them find solutions.
Nikki: Yes. And I will reiterate what I said earlier, just about using the resources of these professionals. They're working so hard every day to get caught up to speed with these changes and with always being on top of what is needed to help their students. And I think you both started our podcast today talking about how much you care about the students you work with and how passionate you are about financial aid, and a lot of that I know just from knowing both of you that you will do whatever it takes to answer their questions and to find those answers and resources to help them.
[40:25] Kristin: And I do think it's a time that there's probably not one solution, right, or one approach. That it really is something that we have to approach as a community, that students are aware, that they're able to understand the challenges, how to approach funding their legal education, how to approach some of those unknowns, and where they can find that information. And then, as you mentioned, finding the helpers, and I think there are many that right now want to be able to be a resource at this time.
Nikki: I think we have covered quite a bit, and this is an extremely complex topic. But I just would like to ask if either of you have any last thoughts you'd like to share or if there's anything that didn't cover today that you wanted to make sure that we discuss.
[41:10] Sydney: I did want to cover, because it's something that had come up just about working—you know, I mentioned I worked three jobs in college; I worked three jobs in law school, and I know that different schools have different rules on working—my personal philosophy is, if you are going to work in law school, it needs to be something that is high pay, low hours. Right? So I babysat, I taught piano, I tutored, I did other, like, kind of higher paying things or things that I could do my homework while I did that.
But I do want to also say that, while it was really beneficial and I needed to do it for like my personal expenses, you know, it didn't add up, like, $20,000 a year. I've been asked from our students, you know, "If I can only borrow this, and I have $30,000 left, like, can I just get a part-time job and make payments on that $30,000?" And while I'm never going to tell you no, because I'm a lawyer and so the answer is always “it depends,” it's not, like, a great plan to think about working enough to cover such a high amount. Because it is very difficult to balance with 1L. Just with all the other responsibilities that you have, you don't really have 20 hours. I think I worked maybe 10 or so hours, and then some of it, I worked at my housing to get housing break. So there are some creative things that you can do there, but I just wanted to add that, because I know that there are some very industrial students listening who are like, "I will just get a job. I will just do something that pays $35,000 a year, $40,000 a year, and then I'll, like, cover this gap." That may be, like, the most stressful plan that you can make.
[42:40] Kristin: I would co-sign that, and it did make me think very often where, as students are entering law school and they're thinking about the cost for that 1L year and planning for that, that it is good, also, to think about other opportunities that may come up in your second or third year. Maybe there's one that offers an opportunity to work as a research assistant or something that might offer some tuition remission. So being thoughtful about making the decision to work and whether or not that's right for you, but thinking also about where might there be other opportunities to add additional awards later in law school.
And then I think you mentioned a takeaway. I was reading an article today, and there was a survey published. There was 5,000 undergraduate students that were interviewed. And some of the statistics that came out of the survey were, only about a quarter of those students felt that they really understood the cost of attendance, the real cost of attendance. I know we spent a lot of time on that today. But my hope again is that we do bring more awareness to that and that portion of the equation for students where, you know, those other expenses that have to be considered in 1L year and in your subsequent years. Those are areas that student is in the driver's seat. So we provide an estimate of what those categories of expense would be based on average expenses, but might there be an opportunity for students to reduce those, and think about approaching those?
And then the other point that came from that survey was that most students, if an expense came up, an emergency expense of $500 or $1,000, that would be a make-or-break thing for them. And so, again, I just want to go back to thinking about costs and thinking about resources and really engaging with the financial aid office, with law school administrators, with wonderful resources like Sydney offers and AccessLex and others, and thinking about, you know, where might there be opportunities for more funding, for cost reduction, those things that could be in your control?
[44:44] Sydney: I love that. And I hope that we'll even see colleges take on—you know, the same way that high schools do have financial aid info sessions for going to college, I would love to see more colleges have financial aid info sessions for going to graduate school or law school. I think that the more that we get this information out—part of my lack of understanding for law school loans was because I didn't understand my college loans; you know, I just carried that same, I think there's a promissory note, I signed something and then you let me enroll in class, like that is the overwhelming understanding that I had for the four years that I was in college—even if a college doesn't feel equipped to tackle graduate school financial aid, maybe making sure that students deeply understand their own financial aid. Because I think nowadays, I have seen most parents do it themselves. They handle the FAFSA, they handle and the student is not really involved. I get that and I understand that on some level, but I think, by the time your kid's a junior or a senior in college, they need to understand if their loans, if it's a bill, the more that students in college can understand their own financial aid, can understand what a loan servicer is and when they pay and the interest rate and if it's deferred and all of those things that are, I would say, foundational information that help you understand graduate school financial aid, then I think the more prepared we'll be as a society. Because a lot of the confusion right now is stemming because people never actually understood college financial aid.
Kristen: Right.
[46:14] Nikki: Yes, I completely agree. And I love the ideas of empowering our students to have that knowledge. I started, gosh, I don't even want to say how many years ago, as a school counselor in a high school, and I was doing, like you said, Sydney, these financial aid presentations to juniors, junior parents, and it would be great if more forethought was put into this plan and the financial literacy that goes with it and just good habits in general going into college and to graduate school. So I really appreciate your insights on all of that. It's so, so helpful. Anything else that either of you would like to add before we wrap things up today?
Sydney: It is not all bleak. You can do it. It will be okay.
Kristin: Yes.
Nikki: That's a good point. Let's end on—there so many positives and there are resources there to help. That's such a great way to end, Sydney.
Kristin: Yes. I think that's great. The map may have some alternative directions, but you can still reach your destination, and there are many people who want to help, and there's still a path to do that. And so I love the positivity.
Nikki: I agree. I agree so wholeheartedly. And I just want to thank you both, again, so, so much for your time and for sharing your incredible experience with our listeners and all of the expertise that you bring to this so important field of financial aid. So thank you both again for being here with us today.
Sydney: Oh, thank you so much for having us.
Kristin: Yes. Thank you.
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