Cost of Attendance

Brandeis Law is proud to offer its world-class education at an affordable rate. To help you plan for your education, we have provided information about the cost of attendance below.

The cost of attendance, determined by the Student Financial Aid Office, is simply an estimate of a student’s educational expenses; students' actual expenses will vary. The figures are then used by SFAO to calculate eligibility for federal student loan aid. An individual student's cost of attendance depends on their residency, program, housing and enrollment status.

University policy generally requires that tuition and fees be paid in full at the beginning of each term on or before the designated due date. Payments and all other matters relating to financial obligations are handled by the Office of the Bursar.

Below is the estimated cost of attendance for full-time students living off campus for the 2024-2025 academic year:

In addition, certain fees charged by either the University of Louisville or by Brandeis Law are not included in the cost of attendance calculation, as they are not bundled with tuition:

¹ Tuition and fees are set by the Board of Trustees of the University of Louisville and are subject to change from year to year. University fees bundled with tuition include the student activity, student building, student services, university facility, student athletics and student health fees.
² Living expenses will be adjusted for students living in housing on a military base or for which they receive a basic allowance under 37 USC 403b, or for those living on campus with or without dependents.
³ The Primary Care Health Fee may be waived with proof of health insurance.
⁴ First-year students are charged a one-time Orientation fee. The fee applies only to the Fall semester in which a first-year student matriculates and does not recur.

Residency

For tuition purposes, Kentucky residency status is determined in accordance with Kentucky Administrative Regulation 13 KAR 2:045 and University of Louisville policy. Brandeis Law will make an initial determination of residency based on information provided in this application. Applicants who are admitted to the JD program as nonresidents but who believe they can validly claim Kentucky residency may contact the Office of Admissions, who will in turn notify the University's Residency Appeals Officer. Appropriate documentation will be required to support any such claim.

Students at the University's professional schools, including Brandeis Law, are not eligible for the Indiana Tuition Reciprocity Program. As such, Indiana residents admitted to the law school, including those enrolled as an undergraduate student at the University of Louisville, will be billed at the nonresident tuition rate.

For more information regarding residency determination for tuition purposes, please contact the University Registrar or visit the University’s dedicated Residency webpage.

Brandeis Law offers institutional scholarship funding to incoming students to help defer the cost of tuition. Applicants are automatically considered for all available institutional scholarship funding with no separate application required. While not the only factors considered by the Admissions Committee in allocating scholarship funding, an applicant’s LSAT score and undergraduate GPA will be strongly taken into account. Brandeis Law does not consider financial need in making scholarship offers.

Scholarship offers are made on a rolling basis as part of the admissions process. Applications that are complete and ready for review by the Early Bird application deadline of January 1 are given priority in determining offers of institutional scholarship funding. Applications that are incomplete as of January 1 but complete and ready for review by the regular application deadline of April 1 will be considered for institutional scholarship funding to the extent that funding remains available. Applications that are incomplete as of the regular application deadline are generally ineligible for institutional scholarship funding.

Upper-Level Fellowships

In addition to scholarship, Brandeis Law offers several funded fellowship opportunities to upper-level students. Some fellowships are programmatic in nature and center on specific areas of legal work and research. The Human Rights Advocacy Program, Ordered Liberty Program and Resilience Justice Project each offer fellowships designed to support the programs' efforts and engagement with the greater legal community.

Other fellowship opportunities may center around impactful but unpaid professional work experiences. The Breonna Taylor Legacy Fellowship, first awarded in 2023, provides a $9,000 stipend to selected rising third-year students who accept a legal volunteer position over the summer with a social justice nonprofit organization or agency. Likewise, the Kentucky Bar Foundation IOLTA Fellowship, Ellen Ewing Fellowship, and Samuel L. Greenebaum Public Service Fellowships respectively provide available funding for students to work at the Kentucky Department of Public Advocacy, Legal Aid Society of Louisville, Louisville Metro Public Defender's Office or other positions in service to the public interest.

External Scholarships

Institutional scholarship is not the only potential source of funding for students. Many public agencies, charitable organizations and private firms also offer scholarship opportunities to students pursuing a legal education. We encourage prospective and current students alike to explore the AccessLex Law School Scholarship Databank, a searchable and filterable database of hundreds of available scholarship opportunities and writing competitions, curated by the nonprofit AccessLex Institute.

External scholarship opportunities may be open to incoming law students or those currently enrolled at law school. Each scholarship establishes its own application requirements, preferred qualifications and terms of eligibility. In some cases, students who have applied to law school but have not yet been accepted may apply for a scholarship but must be accepted to and enroll in a JD program by the time the scholarship is awarded. The University of Louisville Brandeis School of Law makes no representations or warranties as to the continued availability or terms of any external scholarship opportunity.

For additional information about general external scholarship opportunities, please visit the University of Louisville’s Student Financial Aid Office website.

The availability of federal student financial aid can be a major consideration in planning your educational future, so it is important that you clearly understand how to apply for federal financial aid and your responsibilities during the process.

All financial aid is processed centrally by the University of Louisville’s Student Financial Aid Office. Neither the Office of Admissions nor any other personnel at Brandeis Law has access to federal student loan information. For more detailed information on financial aid processing, packaging and disbursement, please contact SFAO at (502) 852-5511 or finaid@louisville.edu.

Completing the FAFSA

The Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) is an application you must complete annually in order to qualify for financial education assistance from the government and deferred repayment of such assistance while you remain enrolled. The FAFSA typically opens on October 1 each year, though changes to federal student loans delayed the 2023-2024 FAFSA substantially.

To file your FAFSA and start the financial aid process, follow the steps below. For more detailed information, please review the SFAO Applying for Aid webpages.

The University of Louisville’s FAFSA school code is 001999.

1. Assemble your tax information, including your W-2 and 1040 tax forms.
2. Create an FSA ID if you do not already have one. Your FSA ID will be used to electronically sign your FAFSA.
3. Visit the FAFSA website to complete your FAFSA. If eligible, you may import your tax data into your FAFSA by using the IRS Data Retrieval Tool. 
4. Once your FAFSA has been processed, you will be sent a Student Aid Report (SAR), either by email (if you filed electronically and provided an email address) or else by post. Review the SAR, and if you find any errors, you can make corrections to your FAFSA online or return the paper SAR with corrections.
5. Remember that you will need to complete a Master Promissory Note (MPN) and entrance counseling for each the Direct Unsubsidized Loan and the Direct PLUS Loan before they will be disbursed.

Student Loans

Eligible students may borrow up to a total of $20,500 per year from the federal government in Direct Unsubsidized Loans, previously known as Stafford Loans. You may be familiar with Direct Subsidized Loans from your time as an undergraduate student, but for graduate students the loans are unsubsidized, meaning that the interest that accrues while the borrower is in school and while the loans are in deferment is the responsibility of the borrower, not of the government. You do not have to demonstrate financial need to qualify for a Direct Unsubsidized Loan.

Students may also be eligible to borrow up to the cost of attendance (less any other financial assistance, including Direct Loans) in Direct PLUS Loans, also known as Grad PLUS Loans. A credit check is required, and loans may not be available to students with adverse credit histories. Direct PLUS Loans are automatically awarded to law students who pass the credit check. Because of the historically favorable interest rates and terms, many students who have good credit opt for Direct PLUS Loans over private loans, but you should do your due diligence in determining a lending plan that is right for you.

For both Direct Unsubsidized Loans and Direct PLUS Loans, repayment is not required until six months after graduating, leaving school or dropping below half-time enrollment. However, interest starts accruing as soon as the funds are disbursed and continues to accrue throughout the student’s enrollment and the six-month grace period, with unpaid interest added to the loan balance. Interest rates reset for new federal student loans on July 1 each year and are fixed for the life of the loan. Bear in mind that origination fees will be charged for all federal student loans.

Financial Aid Disbursement 

Most financial aid awards are disbursed to student accounts at the beginning of each semester or upon gaining eligibility during a semester of enrollment. Disbursement of awards is based on compliance with all eligibility requirements, including enrollment status and satisfactory academic progress. Since most awards are based on full-time enrollment, part-time students must complete an enrollment adjustment form prior to the start of classes in order for aid to disburse at the beginning of the term. Enrollment status is established as of the day after the last day to drop and receive a 100% tuition credit, and courses for which a student is on a standby list are not included in the student’s enrolled hours.

Disbursed financial aid that exceeds the balance owed to the University is considered excess. Excess financial aid will be delivered to you in accordance with the University’s refund delivery process. For more information on how to establish your preferred refund method, please refer to the University Bursar’s website.

Some Brandeis Law students may also be eligible for specific service-based benefits that assist with the cost of their education.

Military Benefits

The University of Louisville is dedicated to serving those who have served our nation in the armed forces by helping to connect them with educational support resources, including a range of military education benefits that may be available to eligible veterans or their family members. Awarded Gold status for 2024 by Military Friendly^®, the University of Louisville participates in the Yellow Ribbon Program and assists students with processing both federal VA educational benefits and those through the Kentucky Department of Veterans Affairs. To discuss available benefits and other resources for students with military connections, please contact the Center for Military-Connected Students.

Tuition Remission

The University of Louisville offers limited tuition remission for eligible employees who enroll at UofL, including the JD program at Brandeis Law. Full-time employees are eligible to receive a tuition credit for up to two courses per semester, worth no more than 8 credit hours in total, while part-time employees are eligible to receive a tuition credit for one course per semester, worth no more than 4 credit hours. University fees, including those typically bundled with tuition, are not covered by tuition remission.

Because of the structure of the first-year JD curriculum, it would not be possible for tuition remission to fully cover the costs of either the Fall semester or Spring semester, even with the reduced first-year course load. Employees are reminded that the first year of law school is particularly time- and effort-intensive, and it may not be appropriate to maintain their current work schedule while enrolled.

Tuition remission for dependents applies only to a dependent's first undergraduate degree and therefore does not apply to the JD program at Brandeis Law. For more information, please visit the Human Resources website.