Charlotte School of Law closed five years ago, but many former students are still contending with big loans from a school that lost its accreditation and license. There are a couple attempts to help relieve that debt.
Under the borrower defense rule, students who took out federal loans can get their debt canceled if they can prove the school defrauded them. A rewrite of that rule was released last month.
North Carolina Attorney General Josh Stein says that prompted the state to petition the Department of Education to relieve the debt of former students who enrolled at the for-profit Charlotte School of Law during or after the fall of 2013.
“Because the rule is much stronger than it used to be, we’ve petitioned the department of education to allow students who have big loans from Charlotte School of Law to get another bite of the apple, to have their future have some possibility without the burden of this heavy debt,” said Stein.
Stein says the school violated state law by making promises to students it couldn’t keep. A few years before it closed, admission standards for the school were among the lowest in the country and its bar passage rate the lowest in the state.
Former Charlotte School of Law students who already filed under the borrower’s defense rule would have their debts canceled under a settlement in a class action lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Education. A federal judge in California granted preliminary approval earlier this month. The settlement includes more than 200,000 students who say they were defrauded by their schools. It lists more than 150 colleges (mostly for-profit), including Charlotte School of Law.
