Hi there future applicants!

I plan to apply to some of the T14 Law Schools' LLMs for 2016/17 and I am doing some research regarding financial aid they offer. I thought it would be useful to make a list (I've added UCLA - mostly for a "selfish" reason since it's the only one not in the T14 that I consider applying to) and include the information that can be found on their websites. What would be really great would be to hear about some of the actual offers being made (e. g. "I was offered 30k grant and 20k loan from xy, "my friend was offered..."), especially the "general" ones, not the ones offered only for a certain region/area of interest/... So here it goes (alphabetically):

BERKELEY (Traditional Track)
- solely merit based
- a competitive $30,000 scholarship program for admitted LL.M. students, for whom Berkeley Law is their first choice

U of CHICAGO
- solely need based (not sure, bet seems like it: "admitted applicants will be asked to supply information about their own and their family's financial circumstances")
- grants are available only in a small portion of the total cost

COLUMBIA
- primarily need based
- these awards generally cover only a portion of the total amount required for tuition and living expenses
- a number of other specialized fellowships and scholarships (http://web.law.columbia.edu/admissions/graduate-legal-studies/tuition-fees-and-financial-aid/financial-assistance-fellowships-and-loans )

CORNELL
- solely merit based fellowships

DUKE
- merit based
- a small amount of scholarship assistance
- Global Leaders Scholarship Program (only for applicants from China) - one full-tuition scholarship

GEORGETOWN
- merit based (not sure: "on the basis of students' LL.M. applications, Georgetown Law will select a group of applicants and invite them to apply for the scholarships")
- a small number of partial scholarships
- specialized scholarships & fellowships (http://www.law.georgetown.edu/admissions-financial-aid/graduate-admissions/fellowships-scholarships-financialaid/index.cfm )

HARVARD
- primarily need based
- offered in the form of both grants and loans
- the average grant is approximately half of tuition; for a small number of students with particularly acute financial need full tuition and a portion of living expenses
- in addition, offering access to educational loans
- everyone in the LL.M. class of 2015-2016 who demonstrated financial need received some form of aid, whether as grant, grant and loan, or loan only; typical financial aid award is part grant, part loan; 60% of LL.M.s received need-based aid (grant and/or loan); 39% of 2015-2016 LL.M.s received grants from other sources within Harvard University (e.g., Frank Knox Memorial Fellowships and Albert Sachs Scholarships) or non-Harvard sources (e.g., Fulbright scholarships); for 2015-2016, the average grant awarded is approximately $24,800; average loan is approximately $22,200

U of MICHIGAN
- combination of need & merit based
- Michigan Grotius Fellowship (no information regarding the amount)
- specialized scholarships (http://www.law.umich.edu/prospectivestudents/graduate/Pages/financialaid.aspx )
- "in a typical year, between 30 and 40 percent of graduate students attending have been awarded a fellowship"

NYU
- merit based
- Hauser Global Scholars Program (provides full tuition and reasonable living expenses)
- Arthur T. Vanderbilt Scholarships (full-tuition)
- Deans Graduate Awards ("varying amounts")
- Taxation Program Scholarships (http://www.law.nyu.edu/graduateadmissions/scholarshipprograms/taxationprogramscholarships )

NORTHWESTERN
- combination of need & merit based
- generally cover only part of the tuition

U of PENN
- merit based
- Regional Merit Scholarships (for applicants from Africa (Imasogie Scholarship); Australia, Brazil, Canada, China (PRC), European Union, Israel, Japan)
- General Merit Scholarships (applicants from other countries/regions)
- several other scholarships (https://www.law.upenn.edu/admissions/grad/penn-law-scholarships.php )

STANFORD
- financial aid not offered

UCLA
- combination of need & merit based (Dean's Tuition Fellowship Awards)
- typically in the amount of 25% to 50% of the total cost of tuition

U of VIRGINIA
- combination of need & merit based
- generally, financial aid grants cover less than one-third of the cost of tuition

YALE
- need based grants and loans
- the maximum possible grant is the amount of tuition

That's it - while this only took some research and copy-pasting, a real added value would be to get as much first hand information as possible from the recent applicants (and any corrections/missing information to the list above). Wish you all a lot of luck!

I'm afraid you're not asking the right question. How much funding is available to LLM applicants? In short, very little. US top schools make huge profits on LLMs without affecting their rankings. To my knowledge, very very few students received any financial aid at Northwestern (class of 2010), and that aid was awarded only on a need basis

While I'm sure it depends from school to school, I cannot agree entirely. Check the info for HLS above ("everyone in the LL.M. class of 2015-2016 who demonstrated financial need received some form of aid; the average grant awarded is approximately $24,800; average loan is approximately $22,200"), NYU also offers a number of extremely generous (merit based) scholarships etc.

NYU admits around 425 LLMs per year... how many scholarships they make available to LLM candidates? The same goes for Harvard. Besides, it very much depends where you come from and how you rank compared to applicants from your own country/world region. I find it telling that they do not mention how many scholarships they awarded over the 150 LLMs they admit per year

I do agree these two are different questions, but I disagree that only one of them is the "right" one. For example, last year NYU awarded 10 Hauser and 16 Arthur T. Vanderbilt scholarships (plus the Deans Graduate Awards). Despite the high volume of accepted students, this is still quite a substantial number, especially considering how generous these are (or at least are claimed to be). I wouldn't have started this thread had I not at least hoped I (or someone else on this forum) had a chance of getting some financial aid, so it would be more useful to receive information regarding the amounts, and not regarding the level of difficulty to get them (plus, the latter is a much more complex topic to discuss).

I've no stakes in this thread, and I personally wish you get as much financial aid as you hope. That being said, you need to be 'very needy' to get that financial aid. The fact that you may not have the money to pay for it doesn't make you automatically worthy. This is, in sum, what I observed in my own experience (I applied for aid, and I got 0 USD)

Hey! Can you elaborate what would qualify as 'very needy'? I was hoping to apply for financial aid and my financial data would show that although I can afford the LLM, it would be quite a stretch, so wouldn't this normally mean 'very needy'?

Hey! Can you elaborate what would qualify as 'very needy'? I was hoping to apply for financial aid and my financial data would show that although I can afford the LLM, it would be quite a stretch, so wouldn't this normally mean 'very needy'?

But you need to be able to afford it even if barely to qualify for admissions, so I am quite confused as to what would be very needy. Yep, it is quite a decision.

But you need to be able to afford it even if barely to qualify for admissions, so I am quite confused as to what would be very needy. Yep, it is quite a decision.