NORTHWEST CONSORTIUM LAW SCHOOLS
NON-DISCRIMINATION POLICY

The Northwest Consortium of Law Schools provides placement services to all students and graduates, on an equal opportunity basis. We do not knowingly furnish assistance and facilities for interviewing and other placement functions to persons, firms, agencies, or organizations that discriminate in their selection of candidates or employment on the basis of race, color, religion, national origin, sex, age, handicap or disability, sexual orientation, marital, parental, or veteran status, or the prejudice of clients.

The Northwest Consortium of Law Schools notifies employers of our non-discrimination policy and inform them that a request to use any of our placement services in any manner is, by that request, their acknowledgment that they are willing to adhere to our non-discrimination policy. The Northwest Consortium of Law Schools expects that all employers will consider, in good faith, each applicant on the basis of his or her individual merits.

The United States Armed Forces historically has discriminated against persons on the basis of their age, gender, and sexual orientation. While those policies have been in flux in recent years as a result of executive and judicial action, the Armed Forces continues to discriminate on the basis of age, gender, and sexual orientation in a manner inconsistent with the Law Schools’ Non-Discrimination Policy. Consequently, the Law Schools have not allowed Armed Forces recruiters (Army, Navy, Air Force, and Marines) to recruit on campus or to receive assistance from Career Services. Recently, however, Congress amended federal law to withdraw federal financial support (including certain types of student financial aid) to institutions of higher education that do not allow military recruiters access to campus or to certain student information. Department of Defense regulations implementing these provisions make clear that, if the Law Schools continue their policy of denying military recruiters access to campus and to certain student information, students at the Law Schools will lose certain financial aid.

In response to this threat, and for no other reason, The Northwest Consortium of Law Schools concedes an exception to its non-discrimination policy to military recruiters, to be in effect only while federal regulations continue to threaten elimination of financial aid in response to enforcement of non-discrimination. The Northwest Consortium of Law Schools abhors in the strongest terms the policy of the Department of Defense and the United States Congress and regrets the need to succumb to their threats. The Law Schools support efforts to change both this law and the military policy discriminating on the basis of age, gender and sexual orientation.