For Cassandra Zamor, a third-year student at FIU College of Law, the dream of becoming an attorney began in middle school while watching crime documentaries with her mother. But turning that dream into reality has come with a heavy price tag.
“I come from a single-parent household,” Zamor says. “I applied for scholarships, but they were small and didn’t renew. I thought about going out of state, but I got discouraged because it would be more money, so I stayed home to save as much as I could. I’ve basically gone to law school through loans.”
By graduation, she estimates her debt will total $75,000. Zamor’s experience reflects a broader crisis: as costs rise and federal supports like Grad PLUS loans face elimination, the pathway into the profession is narrowing, especially for minority students.
The cost of entry
The barriers begin long before the first day of class. Black, low-income, and first-generation students often face financial and logistical hurdles just to apply to law school. For Olabisi Omoniyi-Alake, a first-year student at Georgetown Law, the admissions process was both emotionally and financially exhausting…