Brown to Pay $19.5M to Settle Lawsuit Claiming It is Part of "Price-Fixing Cartel"

Brown to Pay $19.5M to Settle Lawsuit Claiming It is Part of "Price-Fixing Cartel"

Brown University will pay $19.5 million to resolve a lawsuit that accused them — and other Ivy League and top higher education institutions — of favoring wealthy applications in admissions. 

The 61-page class action complaint had been filed in U.S. District Court in the Northern District of Illinois against Brown University and 14 other universities in January of 2022. 

The plaintiffs alleged:

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"Defendants are private, national universities that have long been in the top 25 of the U.S. News & World Report rankings for such schools. These elite institutions occupy a place of privilege and importance in American society. 

And yet these same Defendants, by their own admission, have participated in a price-fixing cartel that is designed to reduce or eliminate financial aid as a locus of competition, and that in fact has artificially inflated the net price of attendance for students receiving financial aid."

The plaintiffs claimed the schools conspired to restrict aid by violating a pledge not to consider students’ finances in making admissions decisions, giving wealthy students an edge.

The schools, including those that have reached settlements, have denied wrongdoing.

In addition to Brown, Yale and Emory said they would each pay $18.5 million and Columbia and Duke both said they would pay $24 million.

The amount of Vanderbilt’s settlement has not been disclosed. The University of Chicago, which was the first school to settle, said it planned to pay $13.5 million.

Total settlements in the case now total $118 million. 

The 10 remaining defendants include Cornell University, University of Pennsylvania and Georgetown University.