A federal appeals court denied a request on Monday to rehear a challenge to a Kansas law that allows some illegal immigrants to pay cheaper, in-state tuition at the state’s public colleges.

The decision, by a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit, in Denver, upheld the court’s ruling in August on the matter.

In that decision, the panel ruled that a group of students and parents who paid higher, out-of-state tuition at public colleges in Kansas, and who were challenging the tuition law, did not have standing to sue. The court, upholding a 2005 ruling by a federal district judge, said the students and parents had failed to provide evidence that they had been directly harmed by the Kansas law, or that they would benefit if the statute were removed.

The plaintiffs — all of whom are U.S. citizens who live outside of Kansas — have argued that the Kansas law on immigrant tuition violates the equal-protection clause of the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution as well as a 1996 federal immigration law.

They wanted federal courts to require the state to either eliminate the tuition benefit or offer the same tuition rates to all U.S. citizens, regardless of their state of residence.

The Kansas law, which took effect in 2004, allows immigrants to pay in-state tuition rates at state institutions if they attended a Kansas high school for at least three years and graduated, or if they earned a General Educational Development certificate, commonly known as a GED, in Kansas. The individuals also must prove that they are actively seeking legal immigrant status or plan to do so as soon as they are able. —Sara Hebel