It seemed that Boise's Concordia University School of Law had escaped closure when a Minnesota university agreed to take it over after its parent university in Oregon announced plans to shutter in February.

But that rescue plan ultimately fell through, and the school announced Thursday that it will close—making it the sixth American Bar Association-accredited law school to shut down since 2016.

"We are absolutely heartbroken for our prospective and current students, our alumni, our faculty and staff, and our supporters and donors who have worked so hard over the last eight years to build a law school up from scratch," said Interim Dean Latonia Haney Keith in a June 25 announcement of the school's closure. "I can't thank everyone enough for their work, energy, and commitment to this law school and the values we stand for."

It's an abrupt reversal for a law campus that appeared to have a viable path forward, even as the 115-year-old Portland Oregon-based Concordia University closed in May due to falling enrollment and financial shortfalls. The law school in May received ABA approval to be transferred to Concordia University, St. Paul.

But the two universities were "unable to consummate the transaction" in recent days, according to the announcement. Haney Keith said in an interview Friday that, due to pending litigation, she's unable to provide details on why the deal fell apart. But the issue at hand cannot be overcome, she said, and it's the end of the road for the law school.

"All I can say is that this was a completely unforeseen and unexpected issue that came up, and frankly inexplicable, especially at this late hour," she said. "We were effectively supposed to transition over fully at the end of this month. It came as a great surprise to us here that this issue came up at such a late hour."

The shuttered Concordia University Portland is being sued by education tech company HotChalk, which helped run its online programs, claiming it's owed $300 million, according to a report in the Idaho Statesman. Meanwhile, the Oregon Department of Justice has launched an investigation into the university's collapse.

Concordia's closure indicates that legal education isn't out of the woods, even after emerging from a nine-year slump that saw nationwide enrollment decline and added financial pressures.

Concordia Law now joins the ranks of Indiana Tech Law School, Arizona Summit Law School, Charlotte School of Law, Valparaiso University School of Law and Whittier Law School, each of which has shuttered over the past four years. (Western Michigan University Cooley Law School and Atlanta's John Marshall Law School have also closed branch campuses in recent years, while Thomas Jefferson School of Law and the University of La Verne College of Law plan to drop their ABA accreditation in favor of California accreditation.) However, Concordia is the first law school to cease operations due to the closure of a parent institution. The closure is particularly painful because it's not due to any shortcomings of the law school itself, Haney Keith said. In fact, the school was on an upward trajectory, with 100% of graduates passing the bar exam in recent years, she said.

Like Indiana Tech, which closed after a mere four years, Concordia Law is relatively young. It opened in 2012, which was at the start of legal education's recent downturn, and struggled in its early years. It did not initially earn provisional ABA accreditation and had to scramble to secure a deal with Idaho bar exam officials to ensure that its first graduates could take the exam. Enrollment suffered as a result, but the school's prospects had been improving. It gained full ABA approval in 2019, and the size of the first-year class doubled to 90 students and posted strong bar exam results.

Haney Keith said she informed students of the closure on Thursday via Zoom. "It's painful not to be able to do that in person, without my faculty and staff," she said.

The school is now working on a revised teach-out plan that would enable its 145 2Ls and 3Ls to complete their legal studies, though it seems unlikely that Concordia will be able to remain open to offer that instruction, Haney Keith said. The Idaho Statesman reported that the only other law school in the state—the University of Idaho College of Law—has tentatively offered of take in Concordia's 145 2Ls and 3Ls, though its dean, Jerry Long, noted that an influx of that many students would put a major strain on the school. (According to the latest data from the ABA, Idaho Law's enrollment sits at 333 students.) The school has campuses in Boise and Moscow, Idaho.

The school's admissions office also is working with admitted students to find alternative plans. "We have had to notify all those students and our admissions team is working very closely with them to ensure they can find new homes to begin their legal education in the fall," said Haney Keith.