DeVry University (Illinois): Student Discipline, Dismissal & Federal Court

How do student discipline and dismissal cases work at DeVry?

DeVry University is a private, for-profit university — DeVry University, Inc. is a wholly owned subsidiary of Cogswell Education, LLC — with its home office and a location in Lisle, in DuPage County, and two locations in Chicago, on West Lawrence Avenue and in the Loop. The Higher Learning Commission has accredited it since 1981. There is no separate Illinois rulebook: every location and the online university work from one national 2026–2027 Academic Catalog and Student Handbook, plus a short Illinois addendum. The rule that catches the most students is mechanical. DeVry’s academic integrity sanctions are mandatory and accumulate across every location, course and session — a zero, then an F, then dismissal for at least a year — and the first appeal is due “within 3 days.”

DeVry University is a private institution. There is no state action, so there is no constitutional due process claim, and arguing one wastes an appeal. The theory is contract: Illinois holds that a college and its students have a contractual relationship whose terms come from the catalog and the handbook — Raethz v. Aurora University, 346 Ill. App. 3d 728 (2004), restated by the Fourth District in Urso v. Bradley University, 2023 IL App (4th) 230165 — while adding that the relationship “is unique and cannot be strictly categorized or characterized in purely contractual terms.”

The limit is the standard of review, and it decides most of these cases before anyone reaches the facts. A student has a remedy for an adverse academic decision only if it was made arbitrarily, capriciously, or in bad faith. Frederick v. Northwestern University Dental School, 247 Ill. App. 3d 464 (1993), puts it bluntly — courts have been loath to review, much less overturn, academic dismissals — and Bosch v. NorthShore University Health System, 2019 IL App (1st) 190070, holds that a school which departs somewhat from its handbook still wins unless the departure was material. The federal courts in Chicago apply the same test: in Doe v. Columbia College Chicago, 933 F.3d 849 (7th Cir. 2019), the Seventh Circuit affirmed dismissal of a student’s contract claim where the college had investigated and reasoned its way to a decision, and in Gash v. Rosalind Franklin University, 117 F.4th 957 (7th Cir. 2024), it held that calling a process arbitrary or predetermined, without specific facts, is not enough. What survives is specific: in Liu v. Northwestern University, 78 F. Supp. 3d 839 (N.D. Ill. 2015), a former law student’s claim went forward where the school imposed what amounted to an integrity charge while denying her the handbook procedure for contesting one. Federal law does not care that the school is private: Title IX, Title VI and Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act apply because it takes federal funds, and the ADA applies to it as a place of public accommodation.

A federal claim arising at DeVry University’s Illinois locations is filed in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois — DuPage County (the Lisle location) and Cook County (the two Chicago locations) sit in its Eastern Division under 28 U.S.C. § 93(a), and the statute fixes the places of holding court for that division at Chicago and Wheaton. I am a member of the general bar of that court, admitted on my Florida license under its Local Rule 83.10, which opens the general bar to an attorney in good standing before the highest court of any state. That means a Title IX, Section 504 or ADA complaint for a DeVry student is one I file and litigate under my own name, with no pro hac vice motion. The Northern District abrogated its local-counsel designation rule in July 2023, so a member of its bar with no office in the district no longer has to designate local counsel. One limit, stated plainly: the court keeps a separate trial bar, and under Local Rule 83.12 a general-bar member who is not on it — that is me — appears alone in everything except testimonial proceedings, meaning evidentiary hearings and trial, where a trial-bar member must sit as advisor unless the judge grants the rule’s narrow waiver.

Three integrity strikes, counted everywhere

The Academic Integrity Policy in the Student Handbook covers plagiarism, unauthorized collaboration, paying for work, lying and more, in every kind of coursework. It names AI directly: generative AI tools — the policy lists ChatGPT, GrammarlyGo, CoPilot, Gemini and Claude — “are prohibited in the classroom unless expressly authorized,” and the rule sits under plagiarism. See AI academic integrity accusations.

A professor or administrator first asks to speak with you; if you do not respond “within 5 days” (the policy does not say whether these are calendar or business days), the case proceeds without you. To contest the sanction you must notify the Academic Integrity Support team and file an Academic Integrity Appeal form with IntegrityMatters@devry.edu “within 3 days of receiving the sanction notification” — again no unit, so count calendar days — on one of three grounds: no reasonable evidence, an inappropriate sanction, or new evidence. A Hearing Panel then hears the case. “The advisor may be an attorney,” but advisors “are not permitted to speak or to participate directly in any part of the process.” The panel decides by majority whether a violation is “more likely than not,” and a further appeal is due within three business days; that decision is final.

The sanctions are labeled mandatory. A first recorded offense means a zero for the whole assignment — “No partial grade will be given” — and an Academic Integrity Course; a second, an F with no option to withdraw; a third, an F, withdrawal from your other courses and dismissal for at least one award year, with return only by appeal to the Academic Dean. The third offense “need not be in the same location, course, program session or semester.” Sanctions can be applied retroactively, even after a degree is conferred. More on academic misconduct cases.

The conduct code: a hearing that can be skipped, an appeal that can be withheld

Other misconduct goes to the location’s conduct administrator under the Code of Conduct. The hearing is set “usually not less than two or more than 15 calendar days” after written charges; both sides see the information the panel will consider; an advisor, “including an attorney,” may attend but may not speak, and attendees must be named at least one business day ahead. The standard is “more likely than not.” Two provisions matter most. In severe safety cases, “and where evidence clear,” the conduct administrator “holds the right to bi-pass an official hearing” and impose sanctions up to expulsion. And “the eligibility for the respondent to appeal may be denied depending on severity of the offense.” Where an appeal is allowed, it is due within seven days of receiving the determination letter — the code does not say calendar or business days, and an emailed letter is presumed received the day it is sent — and review is limited to the recorded hearing. An interim suspension can keep you out of online and onsite classes in the meantime; see interim suspension.

Those provisions sit uneasily with DeVry’s other documents. The catalog describes the Code as allowing “notice to the student, an opportunity to respond and participate in the process, and an opportunity to appeal.” DeVry’s Illinois addendum, supplementing Article IV, says both the reporting and the responding party “have the right to appeal” on procedural error, new information or a disproportionate sanction. The addendum is dated February 2020 and still lists suburban locations that no longer appear in DeVry’s directory, but it is the Illinois text, and an argument that DeVry broke its own terms starts there.

Academic dismissal, and the four-day trap

The Standards of Academic Progress require a 2.00 cumulative GPA, a pass in every course by the second attempt, and a 67 percent completion rate within 1.5 times the program’s credits. One semester of academic warning comes without an appeal; failing to recover means dismissal, and failing a third attempt at a course is dismissal with no appeal for a fourth attempt. The Academic Dismissal Appeal is formally due by Tuesday of week 2 of the next session, but a student who does not appeal “within four days of the date of the dismissal notification” — calendar or business, the catalog does not say — is dropped from the next session’s courses. You get four appeals per degree program, the fourth to a national college dean, and denials are “final and cannot be appealed.” In health programs with a practicum, a site can turn you away after a background check or drug screen, and the catalog says such students “cannot finish their programs’ required coursework.” See SAP appeals.

Sexual misconduct under DeVry’s Title IX policy

For sexual misconduct, the federal rule is the 2020 Title IX regulation: the 2024 rule was vacated nationwide on January 9, 2025, in Tennessee v. Cardona, and on September 29, 2026 the Department of Education formally repealed it and restored the pre-2024 text (91 Fed. Reg. 61,308). And as DeVry’s own policy reflects, the 2020 regulation requires postsecondary institutions to hold a live hearing at which each party’s advisor conducts cross-examination. Under DeVry’s Title IX and Sexual Misconduct Policy (version 3.6), the hearing can be held virtually at either party’s request; your advisor “may be, but is not required to be, an attorney,” and DeVry supplies one if you have none. The standard is preponderance of the evidence. An appeal is due “within seven (7) calendar days of the date on the written decision,” and sanctions wait until the appeal is decided. For Illinois students, DeVry provides confidential advising through the YWCA.

What a student defense lawyer can do here

Most of the value is early and quiet. It is reading DeVry’s policy against what the school actually did and finding the gap; writing the response or the appeal so it argues the grounds the policy recognizes rather than the ones that feel most unfair; preserving the federal issues — Title IX, Section 504 and the ADA, FERPA — so they are in the record if the case ever leaves campus; and identifying comparators, because a sanction far outside what similar cases drew is one of the few arguments that reliably moves a decision-maker.

At DeVry two moves are specific. In an integrity case, check the count first — ask in writing for your recorded history, because an offense from any location counts and the number fixes the sanction — and spend the three days on the evidence, since the sanction follows automatically once a finding stands. In a conduct case where DeVry skips the hearing or refuses an appeal, put the catalog’s promise of notice, response and appeal, and the Illinois addendum’s appeal right, in front of the decision-maker in writing.

What a lawyer cannot do is turn a campus process into a trial. The rules of evidence do not apply, there is no discovery, and the school decides its own case at first instance. That is exactly why the written record built during the campus process is the whole ballgame: by the time a court looks at it, the record is closed.

The one Illinois statute that gives you procedure

Illinois has no general statute setting notice periods, hearing formats, standards of proof or appeal rights for college students. The Illinois School Code, 105 ILCS 5, has a detailed suspension and expulsion scheme, and it applies to elementary and secondary schools, not here. The exception is the Preventing Sexual Violence in Higher Education Act, 110 ILCS 155, and it is a real one. It reaches every higher education institution in the state — public universities, community colleges, and private not-for-profit and for-profit institutions alike — and it requires timely written notice of the allegations to all parties, an investigation that is adequate, reliable and impartial, written notice of the outcome, and appeal rights. It requires the school to make confidential advisors available, trained to a statutory standard and kept separate from the people deciding the case. Both parties are entitled to an advisor of their choice, and that advisor may be an attorney — although the institution may limit how far an attorney-advisor participates in a hearing, which is why DeVry’s own rule on that, set out above, still governs what your lawyer may do in the room. The standard of proof is preponderance of the evidence, applied the same way to both sides.

What to do first

1. Diary the right clock. Integrity: 3 days, then three business days. Conduct: seven days from receipt. Title IX: seven calendar days. Academic dismissal: four days.
2. Ask for your integrity record and the evidence — the similarity report, AI flags or proctoring data — from IntegrityMatters@devry.edu.
3. Save the catalog, handbook and Illinois addendum as dated PDFs; the catalog says the newest version supersedes all others.
4. Before a conduct hearing, request the panel’s information in writing and name your attendees one business day ahead.
5. Raise any disability now with the Office of Student Disability Services (ADA@devry.edu). See Section 504 and ADA accommodations and the Illinois student defense hub.

One honest caveat about geography. Illinois has three federal districts. I am admitted to two of them, the Northern and the Southern. A federal claim arising at a school in Springfield, Peoria, Champaign-Urbana or the Quad Cities falls in the Central District; I am not a member of that bar, and those matters I handle with local counsel in that district or by pro hac vice admission. Appeals from the Northern District go to the Seventh Circuit, which keeps its own bar; my appellate admission is in the Eleventh. I say so before a retainer rather than after.

Where I am licensed. I am licensed to practice law in Florida. I am admitted to the bars of the U.S. District Courts for the Southern, Middle and Northern Districts of Florida, the District of Colorado, the Northern and Southern Districts of Illinois, the District of Nebraska, the District of New Mexico, and the Western District of Wisconsin, and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit. Federal court admission is not a license to practice the law of the state in which the court sits. I am not licensed in Illinois and do not advise on Illinois state law or appear in Illinois state court.

The federal money on the line at DeVry

DeVry University students and families, across all of its campuses, took on $228.7 million in federal Direct Loans in the 2025–26 award year — with 183 graduate and professional students also borrowing through Grad PLUS.

Every dollar of it rides on academic standing. A dismissal, a failed Satisfactory Academic Progress evaluation, or a mid-term withdrawal sets off federal rules that decide whether aid continues, whether money already disbursed has to go back, and — under the borrowing caps in effect since July 1, 2026 — whether a student who leaves can still finance a return. The academic fight and the financial aid fight are the same fight, and the windows are short. How those rules work: SAP appeals and academic dismissal.

On the Department’s financial responsibility test, DeVry University’s most recent published composite score is 2.3 (fiscal year 2022–23) — a passing score on the –1.0-to-3.0 scale, where 1.5 and above passes. How to read that number: the federal warning signs guide.

Source: U.S. Department of Education, Federal Student Aid Data Center, Direct Loan volume by school, award year 2025–26 (cumulative through June 30, 2026). Institution-wide federal Direct Loan totals, all campuses.

Other schools in the Northern District of Illinois

Every school writes its own dismissal, appeal and conduct rules, and the deadlines are rarely the same from one campus to the next. These pages set out the procedure at other schools in the Northern District of Illinois:

• Dominican University
• East-West University
• Elmhurst University
• Erikson Institute
• Fox College
• Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary

Common questions about DeVry student cases

How long do I have to appeal an academic integrity violation at DeVry?

Three days from receiving the sanction notification: notify the Academic Integrity Support team and submit the Academic Integrity Appeal form to IntegrityMatters@devry.edu. The handbook does not say calendar or business days, so treat them as calendar days. If the Hearing Panel rules against you, a further appeal is due within three business days, and that decision is final.

Can I bring a lawyer to a DeVry hearing?

Yes, as an advisor at your own expense — but in academic integrity and Code of Conduct hearings the advisor may not speak or participate directly, and you present your own case. In a Title IX hearing your advisor, who may be an attorney, conducts the questioning. Either way, much of a lawyer’s work at DeVry is the written response and appeal.

What standard of proof does DeVry use?

“More likely than not” in academic integrity and Code of Conduct hearings, and preponderance of the evidence — the same test — under the Title IX policy. A conduct appeal asks only whether the facts were “reasonably sufficient” on the recorded hearing, so the hearing is where the facts are won or lost.

Can DeVry expel me without a hearing?

In some cases. The Code lets the conduct administrator skip the hearing in severe safety cases where the evidence is clear, and lets DeVry deny the right to appeal depending on the offense’s severity; an interim suspension can bar you from classes beforehand. For Illinois students, the Illinois addendum says both parties have the right to appeal, and the catalog promises an opportunity to respond and appeal — raise both in writing.

How many times can I appeal an academic dismissal at DeVry?

Four times in your current degree program, the fourth to a national college dean; an approved program change resets the count. Each appeal needs verifiable mitigating circumstances, proof they are overcome and a realistic plan. File within four days of the notice — the catalog does not say calendar or business days, so count calendar days — to avoid losing next session’s courses. A dismissal for failing a third attempt at a course cannot be appealed for a fourth attempt.