Congress should reconsider existing bankruptcy laws that make discharging student loan debt nearly impossible and some law school closings are on the horizon.
Nancy Rapoport, the former University of Nebraska and University of Houston Law School Dean, issued some predictions at the American Bankruptcy Institute Annual Spring Meeting earlier this week. A couple of her predictions included that some law schools will be closing in the near future and that Congress should work on the existing bankruptcy laws that make it almost impossible for students to discharge loan debt.
“You’ve got this sort-of class of law students who have up to $200,000 or more in nondischargeable debt, many of them can’t find work at all,” Rapoport said. Rapoport works as a professor at William S. Boyd School of Law, University of Nevada. “They’re looking at this huge disconnect,” she said. “Not only can they not make their loan payments, they can’t make their rent.”
Rapoport also said that Congress should change the existing laws so that they give students viable options to help fix student loan debts without causing future challenges economically.
“But what’s not viable anymore, from any perspective, is going to be for people to be running around with this kind of debt that will haunt them for rest of their natural lives,” Rapoport said.
Rapoport did not mention any law schools by name but she did express her concern with some law schools closing in the near future. “I expect some of them to close,” Rapoport said. “The issue is going to be which ones.”
