You may have signed a formal contract with your college, university, or other school program when enrolling. Or you may not have signed a formal contract or cannot remember whether you did so. In any case, both you and your school will owe one another certain obligations under an express or implied educational contract. Retain the Lento Law Firm's premier Student Defense Team if you have educational contract issues with your school. Call 888.535.3686 or use our contact form now to get the skilled and experienced attorneys you need for your best contract dispute outcome.
What Is an Educational Contract?
A contract is simply a mutual, back-and-forth obligation for which each side provides some consideration, meaning something of value, and which each side can enforce against the other side. An educational contract is between the student and the college, university, or other school program. The student generally promises to pay or invoke education lenders to pay for the school's educational services, while the school promises to provide those services. Those back-and-forth obligations generally make for a binding contract. If the student fails to perform, particularly by paying tuition and other charges, then the school can generally enforce performance in the courts if necessary. If the school fails to perform by providing educational services, then the student can generally enforce performance through an administrative or court proceeding.
How an Educational Contract Arises
Educational contracts do not arise like ordinary contracts. In the usual case, say for the sale of a car or home, the parties get together, negotiate the contract terms, and sign a formal document called a sales or purchase contract. In the case of education, the student generally applies online, and the school replies online or by letter accepting the student's application. The student will generally, at some subsequent point, sign or at least electronically submit other documentation, such as a FAFSA application for student aid. The school may also ask or require the student to sign various acknowledgments at an orientation of some kind. Those documents may include a tuition agreement, dormitory or other housing agreement, food services agreement, and agreements relating to the use of library, recreational, transportation, and other facilities and services. Collectively, this documentation will generally describe the mutual obligations of the student and school relating to the provision and use of these services and facilities, even if no single document describes itself as the educational contract.
What If You Did Not Sign an Educational Contract?
If you did not sign a document identified as an educational contract, both you and the school may still owe one another specific obligations that the other side may be able to enforce. State laws generally define when a contract arises. Certain contracts must be in writing and signed by the one against whom the other wishes to enforce obligations. However, annual school tuition contracts do not generally fall within that signed-writing requirement. Instead, state law may imply a school contract under certain situations, even when the parties did not sign an express contract. Your acknowledgment online or in writing of the above tuition, housing, food services, library, transportation, and recreational agreements may be enough to establish an express contract. But if not, then below are two common theories for claiming and enforcing an implied contract.
Partial Performance of an Implied School Contract
Partial performance is a common theory under state law for claiming and enforcing an implied contract, where no express writing signed by the parties may exist. If one party performs part of the contract, and the other party accepts that partial performance, the parties may have an enforceable implied contract. Your partial performance might be paying tuition or inducing the federal government or another lender to do so. If the school accepts that partial tuition payment, then you may well be able to enforce an implied tuition agreement for the school to allow you to attend classes and receive instructional services. If, on the other hand, you occupy student housing and attend classes, the school may well be able to enforce an implied housing and tuition agreement, making you pay for those facilities and services.
Detrimental Reliance on Assurances of Performance
Detrimental reliance is another common state law theory for claiming and enforcing an implied contract where no express writing signed by the parties exists. Detrimental reliance involves one party relying to that party's detriment on the other party's assurance of performance. Once the party detrimentally relies, and the other party knows of that reliance, the other party can become obligated to return the performance. So, for instance, if your school sends you an acceptance letter, and you give up your residence, move to the school's location, sign a housing lease, attend orientation with the school's knowledge and support, and show up for classes, you will likely be able to make the school formally enroll and instruct you according to the implied tuition contract. You will have relied to your detriment on the school's acceptance. Detrimental reliance can be a more difficult theory for the school to prove to claim an implied tuition contract.
The Role of the Student Handbook or Conduct Codes
The online applications, acknowledgments, and instructions that you and the school exchange as you prepare to begin at your college or university may thus form the basis for an express or implied contract. But colleges, universities, and other school programs also typically gather what they regard as a student's and the school's mutual obligations into a student handbook and various student conduct codes. In a dispute with your school, these handbooks and codes may provide the basis for you or the school to make contractual claims that one side or the other promised certain performances. Here are some examples:
● a student conduct code may define whether you breached an implied housing agreement by possessing or using drugs or alcohol on the premises;
● a student academic integrity code may define whether you breached an implied enrollment agreement by cheating on an exam or plagiarizing a paper;
● a student professionalism code may define whether you breached an implied clinical or residency program agreement by failing to follow an instructor's orders or by acts of insubordination;
● a dispute resolution procedure may define the school's obligations to provide you with procedural safeguards before suspending or expelling you from school; and
● a satisfactory academic progress (SAP) appeal procedure may define the school's obligations to permit you to show extenuating circumstances for your academic deficiencies to avoid probation, suspension, or dismissal.
The Role of School Policies in an Educational Contract
School policies can also play an important role in defining the parties' mutually enforceable contract obligations in an educational setting. Whether your college, university, or other school program is a public or private program, it likely has some form of governing board. That board has the authority to adopt policies governing the institution's operation. Those policies can certainly include student conduct codes as well as school obligations to students. For instance, a school board-level policy may require the school to provide students with due process of law in any dispute over student rights and obligations. A school policy may require students to avoid violence, threats, harassment, and other disturbances in orderly school operations. Other board-level policies may address when tuition obligations arise, when the school may or must excuse tuition obligations, and a host of other important school and student interests. In any dispute you have with your school, our attorneys can help you look to school policies for the terms of your educational contract.
The Role of Law and Regulation in an Educational Contract
State or federal law, rules, and regulations can also play an important role in defining the parties' mutually enforceable contract obligations in an educational setting. Both you and your school must generally comply with state and federal legal obligations, no matter what the documentation exchanged between student and school may provide. State and federal law, rules, and regulations may dictate contract-like features on any of the following issues:
● student-aid laws and regulations may determine student rights to relief from tuition obligations and school obligations for notice and hearing on student appeals of tuition and enrollment decisions;
● housing laws and regulations may determine the school's obligations to provide suitable housing, make repairs, and relieve students from housing payments for housing law violations;
● anti-discrimination laws and regulations may determine student rights for relief from school actions or to defend against allegations other students or the school make; and
● disability laws and regulations may determine student rights to receive services and accommodations, and for relief from certain schedule or performance requirements.
Student Obligations Under Educational Contracts
Students can have many obligations under an educational contract, affecting a wide range of student and school rights and interests. Consider the following core examples, along with common disputes that arise out of these student obligations to the school.
Student Tuition as a Contractual Obligation
Paying or committing to pay tuition is a student's primary obligation to the school. Your enrollment and attendance generally commit you to pay tuition, whether by invoking federal student aid or making your own tuition payments. Your dispute may have to do with your prompt withdrawal from classes before attending at all or after attending only a class or two. Colleges and universities generally have strict withdrawal procedures, clearly indicating when a student's obligation to pay tuition arises relative to withdrawal from courses. The University of Alabama's Student Account Services Policy is an example, detailing exactly when a student must notify the school of the student's withdrawal to avoid tuition and housing charges. Failing to meet your school's similar policy may contractually commit you to paying tuition. Let us help you advocate otherwise based on your own extenuating circumstances.
Student Conduct Codes as Contractual Obligations
Your school's student conduct code also contractually commits you to certain behaviors or, more to the point, avoiding certain behaviors. The University of Virginia's Standards of Conduct are an example. Those standards prohibit physical assault, health and safety threats, unauthorized entries, disrupting university operations, disorderly conduct, the violation of health and safety laws, and other behaviors. Schools generally also prohibit weapons, explosives, and possession of illegal drugs and may limit or prohibit alcohol and tobacco use. Your failure to abide by those terms may result in the school pursuing disciplinary charges against you and suspending or dismissing you from the school. Those actions, depending on their evidentiary support and procedural protections, may stand up in court if you were to sue for breach of contract. Let us help you in any such dispute. Our attorneys know how to invoke and navigate the necessary administrative procedures.
Academic Conduct Standards as Contractual Obligations
Your school's academic integrity code also contractually commits you to certain academic standards. The University of North Carolina's Honor Code is an example, prohibiting all forms of academic dishonesty, including plagiarism, exam cheating, unauthorized assistance or collaboration on assignments, and research fraud. Again, if your school were to allege and prove your academic misconduct in a fair proceeding providing you with procedural safeguards, then your school might make its suspension or expulsion stick in a court of law against your claim for breach of contract. But again, let our attorneys help you evaluate your contract and other rights in any such dispute. We have helped hundreds of students nationwide retain their enrollment and preserve their education.
School Obligations Under Educational Contracts
Schools, though, have their own obligations under the educational contracts they form with their students. Our attorneys may be able to help you enforce your contract rights in any of the following situations to get the school services and accommodations you need to preserve your educational program and professional or vocational ambitions.
Academic Progression as a School Contract Obligation
The basic obligation of a college or university is to advance the student's education according to their advertised program. You should be able to expect your school to comply with its advertised curriculum, including that you would receive your degree or certificate when completing all published requirements. Students, though, can face severe and crippling academic progression issues, including in cases in which those issues are due in whole or substantial part to the school's violation of its contractual commitments. Here are a few examples of instances in which our attorneys may be able to help you gain relief based on your educational contract rights:
● your school may, unfairly and in breach of its educational contract, attempt to change curriculum requirements after you have relied on the published requirements to nearly complete your education;
● your school may, unfairly and in breach of its educational contract, place you on probation or suspend or dismiss you, when instructors mistakenly score and grade your exams and assignments, refusing your grade appeals and causing you to fail courses; and
● your school may breach its educational contract by refusing to consider your satisfactory academic progress (SAP) appeal when you have shown extenuating circumstances for your inability to meet minimum grade-point average and other SAP requirements.
Disability Accommodations and Services as a Contract Obligation
Your school also has federal and state law obligations, stated or implied in the educational contract, to provide disability accommodations and services. Your school owes you the obligation to provide access to classrooms, libraries, dining halls, dormitories, clinics, and other school facilities for your wheelchair or other disability. Your school also owes the obligation to have readers, note-takers, enlarged text, sign language interpreters, and other educational services, and accommodated exam rooms and times, among other things, so that you can benefit from instruction despite your learning disabilities. Our attorneys can help you enforce these contractual and legal obligations through your school's administrative procedures, with your school's general counsel's office or other oversight officials, and into regulatory agencies and court proceedings as necessary.
Tuition Relief as a Contract Obligation
Your school may also have contract obligations to relieve you from tuition charges when sudden, unexpected, or accidental injury, illness, death in the family, or other debilitating circumstances interrupt your education. As explained and illustrated above, schools generally require you to notify the school of your withdrawal before the term commences or early in the term to avoid tuition charges. But schools may also have formal or informal policies to relieve students from tuition charges later in the term, at any time before examination, when a student suffers debilitating circumstances beyond the student's control. We can help you identify and invoke those policies for tuition relief in appropriate cases.
Discrimination and Harassment Protection as a Contract Obligation
Your school also has federal and state law obligations, expressed or implied in your educational contract, to protect you against harassment, intimidation, sexual assault, and other misconduct interfering with your education. If an instructor, school official, school employee, or student has discriminated against you, harassed or intimidated you, committed or threatened to commit sexual or other violence against you, or in other unlawful ways kept you from benefiting from your studies, then let our attorneys help you enforce your school contractual rights to be free from that interference. Your school may owe you no-contact orders, course or instructor reassignment, tuition relief, and even money damages for harm caused by others' misconduct. We are here to help you invoke those contractual rights.
Addressing Student Breaches of Educational Contracts
When a school believes that a student has breached the educational contract, the school typically will have an administrative forum within which to address that breach. Colleges and universities may cooperate with local law enforcement in the investigation of campus crimes. They may also cooperate with state or federal officials in the investigation of campus hazing, sexual harassment, or other regulatory violations. Schools may even rarely resort to local civil courts for relief in student disputes. But most often, schools use their own internal administrative procedures to investigate and decide disputes they have with their students. Our attorneys can help you defend your school's allegations that you breached your educational contract, including in any of the following contexts:
● a registrar's administrative determination of your satisfactory academic progress (SAP) appeal for relief from minimum academic standards;
● a registrar's administrative determination of your request for relief from tuition obligations due to debilitating circumstances;
● a disciplinary official's investigation and determination of behavioral misconduct charges against you;
● a professor's or other academic official's investigation and determination of academic misconduct charges against you;
● a disciplinary official's investigation and determination of Title IX or other sexual misconduct charges against you.
Addressing School Breaches of Educational Contracts
Our attorneys can also help you address school breaches of your educational contract. Most often, our representation will be in your school's own administration procedures like those just identified above. We can help you take SAP appeals, invoke emergency relief from tuition and other financial charges, invoke protective procedures against sexual or other harassment, and defend against misconduct charges of all types. But even if you have already lost all administrative hearings and appeals within your school, we may be able to advocate and negotiate with your school's general counsel's office or other oversight officials. The reputation and relationships of our skilled and experienced attorneys have successfully helped hundreds of students nationwide obtain relief in school disputes over educational contract breaches and violations of other student rights and interests.
Premier Attorneys Available for School Contract Issues
If you face educational contract issues with your college, university, or other school program, retain the Lento Law Firm's premier Student Defense Team to help you address those issues. We have helped hundreds of students nationwide resolve all kinds of contractual and other issues with their schools. Call 888.535.3686 or use our contact form now to get the skilled and experienced representation you need to resolve your educational contract issues.
