Getting money back from a graduate school program that failed to deliver!

July 29, 2008 12:55 PM

Should I consult with a lawyer about getting a tutition reimbursment from my graduate school program?

My graduate school program clearly broke their contract that was
stated very clearly in a published manuel. I was in top rated Masters of Social Work program and not getting any supervision- something I was actively paying for.

There were also other things the school botched as well-
my advisor didn't get back to me about papers I had written, there was no one evaluating my work, dysfunctional field placement, etc. After becoming overwhelmed with the situation, and when things didn't improve very much after I complained, I took a leave of absence.

After a lot of complaining to the school, they offered to give me a
partial tuition waver if I decided to go back and resume in the fall.
This isn't them giving me money- this is just me not losing anymore
money. However, I have decided to withdraw, because I feel the program is not in my best interest.

I am asking for my tuition money back, because of the breach of contract and because I was thoroughly dissatisfied with
my experience. They are claiming that they offered me a tuition waver, and that's all. If I don't go back, I don't get any money back, and possibly lose all my credits as well.

I am considering seeing a lawyer, to at least put some pressure on the school to offer me something. I firmly believe that I didn't get the quality of experiencethat I thought I was going to get- this is one of the very top MSW programs, who touts the quality of their education.

It's seems ridiculous that I paid for something & I didn't receive any of the educational goals that THEY put clear and in writing. Other students agree that such an abberation from the guidelines deserves some compensation.

Any thoughts about how to go about getting reimbursed financially?

posted by Rocket26 to education (10 comments total)

Despite your argument being valid in theory, if every graduate student who was disgruntled with the advising "service" they received, graduate schools would be going broke left and right. Many students withdraw from graduate school because it's not what they expected (or hoped).
posted by proj at 1:09 PM on July 29, 2008

A manual is not the same thing as a legally binding contract; in fact, the Student Manual for my institution explicitly says on the first page, "The contents of this manual do not create a contract between any individual and the University." It's possible that different institutions don't have this language explicitly in their student manuals, but even if they don't, you might have a hard time convincing a judge that they were the same thing.

You can always consult a lawyer if you want — maybe there's some weirdness in the specifics of this case that would give you an "in" — but really, don't get your hopes up.
posted by Johnny Assay at 1:45 PM on July 29, 2008

Did you sign a contract with your school or department actually stating that you would receive certain hours of advising or supervision?

A "published manual" sounds suspiciously like a "brochure" which certainly may be misleading on their part, but not contractually binding in a legal sense.

At question then is whether your expectations were artificially high or met a reasonable man standard. It's anecdote, but my own experience and that of others in graduate programs is one of constant irritation and struggle within the department for exactly the types of services you think you're owed.

At the end of the day, from a strictly legal standpoint your school is probably only required to provide you with the classes and instruction you were taking in addition to any services you may have been invoiced for (parking, health insurance, activity fees, etc.)

So while a terse letter from your lawyer may get the attention of someone who matters it may just a easily close a lot of doors for negotiation as your school realizes that your claims for damages (which is really what you're asking for, even though your defining as a refund) are probably unfounded.

In your shoes I would try to put together a time line of the problems you had, and convincing argument for why you feel your school or department didn't keep up their end of a good faith agreement, and then present this to someone in the dean's office. You should reasonably be able to land a meeting with a assistant dean of student affairs pretty easy and they are, in the end, the exact people who would be able to decide this issue.

I would also be satisfied by a partial refund, and you can argue it this way: "If I stay and you give me a tuition waiver that is going to cost you more than if you just refund 50% of my paid tuition now..."

Good luck.
posted by wfrgms at 1:45 PM on July 29, 2008

If I don't go back, I don't get any money back, and possibly lose all my credits as well.

So you want to get your tuition money back, and keep the credits? That sounds implausible.
posted by smackfu at 1:45 PM on July 29, 2008

smackfu, I think you misread the meaning of that sentence. The way I read it, it seems that the school is threatening to invalidate the credits already earned if Rocket doesn't go back to school in the fall. If this is the case I'd like to see how the school thinks it can justify doing that. It's not as if there is some academic dishonesty at hand.

(Now, if Rocket does indeed want to get his/her money back and keep the credits, then I agree that this is unlikely to happen.)

Rocket, consider whether there are concrete steps that the department could take to address your concerns. Is there another advisor that is known for working well with students? Could you switch to him or her? Could they lay out the job placement plan in greater detail? In other words, I would try very hard to salvage the work you've already done.

In any case a number of things in your post sound odd to me:
1) Were you taking courses (i.e. sitting in a classroom and participating in discussion)? If so, it would be almost unthinkable that your professors gave you no feedback on your writing.
2) Did you talk to the department and then the school or did you bypass the department altogether? I've found that going to the department (and specifically the graduate coordinator (or equivalent)) is really the best way to go. That person is intimately aware of the strengths and weaknesses of the professors and is likely to be much more sympathetic than an associate dean that his little working knowledge of the department.
3) Is there some independent review board that ranks MSW programs? How do you know that this is a great school?
posted by oddman at 2:09 PM on July 29, 2008

You're throwing a lot of eggs into this basket (I'm not sure if that's an English expression, but it makes sense to me.) Let's get rid of some of the aspects of your argument that work against you:

1) First of all, work a bit on your grammar (and spelling) and pay attention to what you write. it will not only make you sound a little more intelligent, it will help avoid some questions, like following:

2) You write "I was in top rated Masters of Social Work program," which is a remark open to speculation because of how you wrote it. Were you in "a" top-rated program or "the" top-rated program, or did you mean something else? This matters, because your complaint might lose a little of its credibility if the school can point out that this program is exceptionally well-rated and respected in the general world.

3) I'd be careful throwing around jargon such as "clearly broke their contract." Possibly, they only "described" a program in a published manual (not "manuel.") If the program is very highly-rated, it's possible that any sane legal expert would gauge their description as fundamentally accurate, despite your own experience. You don't make clear the exact content of this manual, nor do you offer enough detail to let readers here speculate on what it was precisely. From what I can gather, to define what may be little more than a brochure as a "contract" may be way out of line with what the legal reality may be. I can't say for sure. If you're not really accurate in this designation, that could work against you.

4) Do you have specific records of the school's failure to respond critically to papers, evaluate your work, the exact "dysfunction" of your field placement, etc? Dates, people involved, and so on? For brevity, you may have left those out, but they're important.

5) The school did offer to give you a break - that's in their favor. Will they say that they addressed your concerns (or promised to in the subsequent semester)? That'll come up. If they did, your decision to withdraw does not necessarily have bearing on their responsibilities.

6) Your "dissatisfaction" is hardly a litigious matter; many (if not most) grad school students are "dissatisfied." That's part and parcel with being a graduate student, and you're not going to change it. Remember: graduate programs - especially top-rated ones - turn away students. There's not much impetus for a school to change policies or programs when the supply of students is never-ending and the program receives good marks. So I'd leave that out.

7) A lawyer's going to cost you money, and you've provided very little reason to think that going this far will do you any good. You write, "I firmly believe that I didn't get the quality of experience that I thought I was going to get," and I'm sure that's 100% true. But your expectations were never a part of any contract. So I'd drop that line of thought as well. Your only chance is to "prove" the school lied or deliberately misled you.

8) Proving such a thing will be hard - you yourself undermine your case. You write "this is one of the very top MSW programs, who touts the quality of their education." Aside from using "who" instead of "which," and "their" instead of "its," and talking about the education of the program rather than the education it provides to students, you've voluntarily admitted that this is a "one of the very top MSW programs." You can see, I'm sure, how that goes against the argument you're trying to make.

9) You also write: "Other students agree that such an abberation from the guidelines deserves some compensation." The opinions of students (let's be honest) come pretty cheaply. Let me ask you: how many of the students in the program are taking or considering similar legal actions? How many will join you in yours? I'm guessing the answer is, none at all. I'd drop that line of accusation as well; it doesn't further your cause.

10) One last thing. You write "It's seems ridiculous that I paid for something & I didn't receive any of the educational goals that THEY put clear and in writing." Well, yes, that would be ridiculous. (This sentence has two serious flaws. You don't receive any "goals?" Isn't that your duty, to create goals for yourself? And I'm not sure what "THEY put clear" means.) But leaving grammar and syntax aside, parse your sentence as a lawyer would. You didn't receive "any" (of what I assume you mean to be) the things the program was to have provided. Any? Think about it, because that's a mighty huge claim.

I feel for you. It's horrible to feel you were cheated, and when properly done, graduate school can be a fun and rewarding experience, not a soul-defeating battle.

I don't mean to be harsh on your grammar, but you are a graduate student. There are expectations here, not to mention the fact that your intelligence and attention to detail could come into play. Much of your language doesn't come across well here - work on that.

You need to get far, far more specific about what the school has done wrong, and how they have really broken any sort of implied agreement, with lots of evidence (beyond a program brochure) of that "contract."

You need to avoid crazy overstatements and legally meaningless comments which may undermine the logical nature of your argument.

If it were me, I'd chalk this up to life experience. I can't imagine that in a case like this - which seems to exist largely as a difference of expectations - the school is going to open their coffers. It'd set a bad precedent, and realistically, they've got pockets deeper than yours would ever be.

You might be able to consult with a lawyer for free. I'm not a lawyer, so don't take any of this as solid legal advice; it's simply my idea of common sense. But if you do see a lawyer, you should add a lot more documentable and solid detail; avoid exaggeration and senseless detail, and have some idea of what you think would be a fair "settlement" before you go in. Right now, yours is a rant, not a logical argument.
posted by Dee Xtrovert at 2:09 PM on July 29, 2008 [4 favorites]

Let me say that I have heard of many people leaving graduate programs for one reason or another, some of which were quite dissatisfied, and I have never heard of anyone getting their tuition back. But my experience is perhaps not extremely wide. I do think it is unlikely that whatever contract you have with your school is anything like you think it is (though if grad students are unionized at your school, you might have a look at that contract and talk to a union rep, as they might have some suggestions).

If I don't go back, I don't get any money back, and possibly lose all my credits as well.

I'm not sure why you would lose your credits exactly, they could probably transfer (though maybe only to some other MSW program). But the fact that you have credits to lose very strongly suggests to me that there is no way you could get money back from your school. That is, you were paying for classes (or at least, classes are a substantial part of what you were actually paying for), and you got what you paid for over that time period.
posted by advil at 5:36 PM on July 29, 2008

Besides many of the excellent points made above, I'd like to know why you wait until the year was finished to make your concerns known to the school. Certainly you noticed that things weren't to your satisfaction before the school year ended? The fact that you waited probably damages your credibility since it looks more like sour grapes than a way of correcting a problem.
posted by loiseau at 8:08 PM on July 29, 2008

In many programs, if you aren't getting along with your adviser or they aren't giving you the feedback you want, you can simply switch to a new adviser.

If your program was completely dysfunctional and you feel like you were treated unfairly due to gender, ethnicity or race, you might have a case.
posted by pluckysparrow at 8:57 PM on July 29, 2008

If you are going to lawyer up (something I would strongly dissuade you from doing) you'll want to set up a meeting with you, your lawyer and the university ombudsman. Even if you're not going to lawyer up, you may want to set up your own meeting. This person (or office of persons) exists solely to handle situations like this and if you want a change in official policy or some sort of reimbursement this person/office will be your best bet. Don't deal directly with colleges, schools or departments, they are not (in most cases) empowered to give you what you want.
posted by 1f2frfbf at 12:17 PM on July 30, 2008