Mitchell Hamline Scholarships

Scholarships are awarded as a percentage of tuition. Scholarship support can be applied to full- or part-time tuition charged for the fall, spring, January term, and summer classes. Scholarships may not be applied to tuition and expenses related to study abroad programs or applied toward the cost of mandatory fees. Scholarships cannot be deferred to a future year.

While Mitchell Hamline recognizes the significant financial investment of a legal education, scholarship awards are based on merit and take into consideration the entirety of the applicant’s academic credentials, academic performance and potential (individual course grades, cumulative undergraduate GPA, LSAT score, graduate school work etc.), personal and professional experience, leadership, volunteer work, etc. For information on need-based financial aid, please visit our website to learn about the various Types of Financial Aid or contact a member of our Financial Aid Office at finaid@mitchellhamline.edu

To be eligible for the scholarship, students must demonstrate in a one-page, double spaced scholarship essay their prior, ongoing experience with, and intent to practice law in an area currently under-served by local lawyers, such as a rural area, a reservation, or a small town or city.

Rationale

Mitchell Hamline’s Native American Law and Sovereignty Institute emphasizes practical legal education and offers a certificate to law students within the J.D. program. The Native American Law and Sovereignty Institute is unique as a legal program at the law school. The institute has dual purposes of furthering legal education in the field of Native American law and of recruiting, supporting, retaining, and graduating law students with Tribal Affiliation. Tribal sovereignty and self-determination are among the goals served by the Institute. In furthering tribal self-government and strengthening tribal law, courts, and governance, the law school offers a scholarship in line with the guarantee of educational support found in many of the four hundred treaties entered into by the U.S. with Tribal Nations.

We maintain a strong connection to the Indigenous peoples of this region and the sovereign Tribal Nations in Minnesota and beyond through both our in-person and blended learning programs. Contributing to the strength of the law school in a variety of ways, the Institute is also engaged in highlighting and supporting the cultural and traditional Indigenous legal principles our Native faculty and students bring to the law school.

Eligibility

To be eligible for the scholarship, students must demonstrate an interest in Native American Law and Sovereignty in a one-page, double-spaced scholarship essay; and, in addition, provide sufficient documentation to establish that they are:

• an enrolled member of a federally recognized American Indian/Alaska Native Tribal Nation;

• demonstrate an ongoing experience working in and with Native American communities and a commitment to using their legal education to continue to do so.

Scholarship applicants are required to provide documentation on their enrollment number or other Native community authority confirming their status of eligibility as stated above.

All other applicants may be eligible for the Native Justice Scholarship by providing documentation to demonstrate an ongoing experience working in and with Native American communities as a career and the intention to use their JD degree in the field of Native American law.

Carefully read the application criteria. Each Mitchell Hamline sponsored scholarship application requires a two page personal statement, a resume, and the Scholarship Application Form. Submit completed applications to the Financial Aid Office.