Schuler Scholars program backs out of scholarships promised to Chicago students

The college dreams of hundreds of low-income and first-generation students from Chicago are up in the air after a north suburban family backed out on a longstanding commitment to provide scholarships just weeks before the start of classes.

“I’m just kind of at a loss for words,” said Marcus Jackson, a participant in the Schuler Scholars program who grew up on Chicago’s South Side. “I just hope something can be done so that everyone can stay in school and not have to be in debt the rest of [their lives].”

“Because nobody asked for this,” he said. “We all put in the work … We literally did what we're supposed to do.”

Former Abbott Laboratories executive Jack Schuler announced earlier this month that his family’s education foundation, which is based in Lake Bluff, was suspending all scholarship payments.

The announcement means hundreds of students set to start class in a few weeks will not be receiving the $2,500 a year promised by the Schulers, nor the many thousands more they were supposed to get to cover their health insurance.

The email, Jackson remembers, included an apology.

“That doesn't make me feel any better,” he said. “It doesn't pay the bills. It definitely doesn't send us through school.”

The Schuler family did not respond to a request for an interview.

Their email to students in July cited financial challenges. Schuler’s estimated personal wealth is reported to have dropped from about $1.1 billion to $200 million. Earlier this year, former employees said, Schuler and his family laid off nearly all of their scholarship program’s staff and started winding down operations.

But, as recently as May, the family vowed to fulfill the scholarships they had already promised to students in college. That was just weeks before they pulled out completely.

“If I was in a position of power, like Mr. Schuler, and I was promising all these kids all these things, I would hope I could just stay true to my word,” Jackson said.

Program has ‘highly demanding requirements’

Jack Schuler and his daughter started the Schuler Scholars program more than two decades ago to help low-income and first-generation Chicago kids go to college.

In exchange for counseling, tutoring and help paying tuition, high school students signed a contract saying they would abide by a laundry list of rules and live under the watchful eye of program staff.

“We gave ourselves to this organization for four years, with some of us even compromising our mental health,” said Stephany Flores, a rising junior at Pomona College in California and Schuler scholar from Englewood. “The Schuler coaches played a really big role in almost being our therapist … because we needed to fulfill these highly demanding requirements in order to get that scholarship.”

Students had to maintain a near-perfect grade point average, take advanced placement classes every year and attend regular meetings with program staff. To get into the program, they had to submit an application and go on a camping trip before the start of their freshman year of high school.

But that was not all. To get the $10,000 scholarship, students in the program, who are mostly Black and brown, had to attend one of the colleges handpicked by the Schulers — most of them small liberal arts schools that serve majority-white student populations.

“A lot of students who go to the ‘Schuler-preferred’ option end up transferring and dropping out because it was really racist, or they did not feel safe or they couldn't find communities that they identified with in that place,” said a counselor who was laid off from the Schuler Scholars program in May.

The former staffer asked to remain anonymous because they signed a non-disclosure agreement to receive severance pay.

“I think [Jack] Schuler was often trying to put a square peg in a round hole and impose what the Schulers thought was best on to students rather than listening to what [students] thought was best for them,” the counselor said.

Jackson, who is Black, said he wanted to go to a big university because he grew up in a big city. Instead he enrolled at Lawrence University, a small college in Wisconsin where he is one of just a handful of Black students. He said his first year was difficult, and he just got used to the school and found his community there during his sophomore year. Without the Schuler scholarship, he said, he will probably have to get a second job in order to be able to stay.

Jackson summed up the Schuler program this way: “‘Go to these schools that you don't really want to go to, and we'll just pay for you.’ And then you go to the schools that are mad expensive and where there's only a few people that look like you. And then they're like, ‘Oh, sorry, we can't pay for your school anymore. But find some way to stay there. And good luck.’”

Legal lines crossed?

Robert Kelchen, who researches higher education funding at the University of Tennessee-Knoxville, said it is very unusual for a scholarship program to end so abruptly without honoring its existing commitments to students. He said students might have been better off had they never been in the Schulers’ program in the first place.

“This affected where they went,” he said. “And [the Schulers] were telling students in May they’ll get the money and then they changed their mind in July — that's where it's really devastating. … If they knew months ago, there's a chance that colleges could have helped them, but that money has all been given out.”

Kelchen said the big question is whether the Schulers did something criminal.

“It's hard to tell whether any lines were crossed or everything just went wrong,” Kelchen said.

The Illinois attorney general is charged with enforcing state rules regulating charities and foundations. A representative from the office said it cannot comment on potential or pending litigation.

Stephany Flores, the student at Pomona, would like to pursue legal action but does not know if that’s practical.

“I just don't think that anyone in the program has the resources to be able to do that, sadly,” Flores said. “And it kind of sucks, right? That we need to have resources in order to fight for the resources that were promised to us.”

Lisa Kurian Philip covers higher education for WBEZ, in partnership with Open Campus. Follow her on Twitter @LAPhilip.