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What criteria and legal rationale did the Department of Education use to deem certain degrees non-professional in 2025?
Executive summary
The Department of Education, via a RISE committee and draft regulatory language implementing the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA/H.R.1), narrowed which graduate programs qualify as “professional degree” programs — a designation that determines access to higher federal loan limits — by recognizing only about 11 primary programs and select doctorates as professional [1]. That redefinition excludes many health and social‑service fields (notably nursing and public health) and is tied to loan‑cap policy changes that eliminate Grad PLUS and set lower graduate borrowing limits [2] [3].
1. What the Department redefined and why it matters — loan caps and program lists
The Department’s reclassification matters because H.R.1 and the Department’s implementing regulations cap graduate borrowing and reserve the higher $200,000 professional‑student limit for a limited set of programs; other graduate students face smaller caps [2]. A Department‑convened RISE committee reached consensus to recognize only 11 primary programs (and some doctoral programs) as “professional,” thereby shrinking the pool of programs eligible for the larger loan allowances [1].
2. The stated criteria and process the Department used
Reporting attributes the draft definition to a committee convened by the Department (the RISE committee) that negotiated consensus language to implement statutory loan provisions; the Department says the committee included institutions of higher education and used language aligned with longstanding precedent on “professional degree” definitions [4] [1]. The Department and its press secretary have framed the definition as consistent with historical practice and consensus‑based committee work [4].
3. Which programs were kept and which were excluded (illustrative lists)
Coverage lists programs kept as professional — medicine, pharmacy, law, dentistry, osteopathic medicine, optometry, podiatry, chiropractic, veterinary medicine, theology, and clinical psychology — while noting exclusions that surprised health and education stakeholders, including nursing, public health (MPH, DrPH), social work, many allied‑health fields, education specialties, and certain business/engineering programs [2] [3] [5].
4. Arguments from critics: workforce and equity consequences
Nursing and public‑health organizations warned the exclusion will reduce graduate borrowing capacity, threaten pipeline development, and could undermine patient care and public‑health preparedness because fewer students could afford graduate and doctoral training [6] [3] [2]. The American Association of Colleges of Nursing (AACN) said excluding nursing “disregards decades of progress toward parity” and contradicts the Department’s own framing that professional programs lead to licensure and direct practice [7] [4].
5. Department pushback and procedural defense
The Department’s higher‑education press secretary told Newsweek that the department “has had a consistent definition of what constitutes a professional degree for decades” and that the committee agreed on definition language to be proposed in rulemaking; the press office disputed some characterizations of the change as inaccurate [4]. The Department is moving toward issuing a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, which will open a public comment period [3].
6. Ambiguities, limits of current reporting, and contested facts
Available reporting documents the committee consensus and lists of included/excluded programs but does not publish the full regulatory text or a legal memorandum explaining statutory interpretation and administrative‑law rationale in detail; hence, the exact legal tests the Department will rely on in final rule language are not included in current reporting [1] [4]. News organizations quote Department spokespeople and professional associations but the full proposed rule and administrative rationale were not provided in the cited coverage [4] [3].
7. Two competing frames: fiscal policy vs. professional parity
The Department’s approach is framed as implementing Congress’s loan‑cap statute and limiting higher loan access to a narrower set of professions — a fiscal and statutory compliance rationale [1] [2]. Opponents frame it as a devaluation of certain licensed professions (nursing, public health, social work) that will constrain workforce development and worsen shortages in critical fields [6] [3].
8. What to watch next — rulemaking and stakeholder responses
The Department is expected to issue a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking that will open a 30‑day public comment period; advocacy groups (AACN, public‑health schools, research universities) have already signaled intent to press for reversals or clarifications during that process [3] [1]. The outcome will hinge on the final regulatory text, the Department’s legal justification in the NPRM, and how courts or Congress respond if stakeholders challenge the reclassification [3] [1].
Limitations: reporting to date relies on committee summaries, organizational statements, and press comments rather than the final proposed rule text or a published legal rationale; available sources do not include the Department’s full regulatory justification or the NPRM itself [4] [1].