August 8, 2026
A Massachusetts federal judge refused Friday to let 32 elite universities duck a proposed class action alleging they used the early-decision admissions process as an anticompetitive scheme to raise tuition, even as she dismissed the consortium and the two college application providers that allegedly facilitated the scheme from the suit.
U.S. District Judge Angel Kelley of the District of Massachusetts issued two rulings Friday. In one, she rejected arguments from some of the schools based outside Massachusetts that the court lacked personal jurisdiction over them. In the other, she rejected omnibus arguments from all 32 schools that the current and former students brought their claims too late or hadn’t articulated a case, while holding that the plaintiffs hadn’t shown any effort to actually join the alleged conspiracy by the Consortium on Financing Higher Education or the Common Application Inc. and Scoir Inc., owner of the Coalition App.
In the main ruling, Judge Kelley credited student arguments that they have standing to sue by connecting high tuitions and thus antitrust injury to the early decision process, by which students commit to go to one school and apply for others only if their applications are denied.
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Counsel for the parties did not immediately respond late Friday to requests for comment.
The plaintiffs are represented by Daniel H. Silverman, Benjamin D. Brown, Richard A. Koffman and Daniel McCuaig of Cohen Milstein Sellers & Toll PLLC and Edward Diver, Peter Leckman and Kevin Trainer of Langer Grogan & Diver PC.
Read Mass. Judge Lets Early-Decision Antitrust Suit Proceed.