Are there court cases or congressional actions challenging DOE guidance on the definition of 'professional' degrees since 2024?

1. What changed and why it matters — a policymaker’s pivot

The Education Department’s proposal revises the regulatory definition of “professional degree” to determine which graduate programs qualify for higher federal loan limits under the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA); proponents of the draft say it tightens loan access to certain programs, while critics say it will remove protections and higher loan caps for many health and service professions previously treated as “professional” ^{[2] [5] [1]}.

2. Who’s being reclassified — real-world impacts named by stakeholders

Organizations including the Association of American Universities, the Association of Schools and Programs of Public Health, nursing groups and professional societies report that degrees such as nursing (MSN, DNP), public health (MPH, DrPH), physician assistant, audiology, speech‑language pathology, occupational and physical therapy, social work and others would lose or risk losing “professional” status under the ED proposal — a move those groups say would reduce graduate students’ access to higher federal loan limits and could make entry to those careers more costly ^{[2] [3] [6] [7]}.

3. Legal risk flagged early by negotiated‑rulemaking participants

Participants in ED’s negotiated rulemaking (the RISE committee) raised explicit concerns that the department’s draft language on “program of study” and the professional‑degree definition creates legal exposure — including a possible student suit — because of vagueness and how it would be applied; ED acknowledged it would reexamine the language during the process ^[4].

4. Litigation so far — reporting vs. public record

The materials you provided include extensive news coverage, advocacy statements and fact‑checks describing the proposal and its consequences, but they do not show a settled, publicly reported federal lawsuit decided after 2024 that overturned or definitively challenged ED’s guidance on this definition; Snopes and major outlets document the proposal and list‑based circulation of affected degrees but do not cite a final court ruling in the sources here ^{[7] [8] [1]}. Available sources do not mention a specific filed and adjudicated court case that resolved the definition issue.

5. Congressional avenues and signals — what Congress can do and has done

The reporting and organizational commentaries name the provision’s origin in statutory loan changes tied to OBBBA and note Congress could act — for example via legislation or oversight — to preserve loan access or to change statutory definitions, but the supplied congressional documents focus on appropriations and other DOE/DOD matters rather than on a named bill expressly overturning ED’s professional‑degree definition in these sources ^{[9] [10]}. Available sources do not describe a specific bill passed by Congress after 2024 that directly blocks or reverses ED’s proposed definition.

6. Stakeholder strategies — comment letters, negotiated rulemaking, and advocacy

Universities, professional associations (AAU, ASPPH, AACN, ASHA) and industry groups are actively submitting comments, raising public‑health and workforce arguments, and engaging the negotiated rulemaking process to seek inclusion of certain programs — a standard administrative route that precedes litigation and can change final agency rules ^{[2] [3] [11] [5]}.

7. Competing narratives and interests — debt control vs. workforce access

ED and some analysts frame the redefinition as a cost‑containment and debt management reform tied to OBBBA; critics frame it as an administrative reclassification that jeopardizes the pipeline to critical professions, with some commentators asserting ideological motives in addition to fiscal ones — the sources record both policy‑cost and workforce‑access arguments without a single settled factual consensus ^{[1] [12] [2]}.

8. Bottom line for readers seeking next steps

If you want to track legal or congressional challenges, watch three threads in public record: ^[13] filings in federal court naming ED’s final rule after negotiated rulemaking and the public‑comment period conclude ^[4]; ^[14] formal congressional hearings or statutory amendments targeting professional‑degree loan eligibility (available sources do not mention such a bill yet); and ^[15] final agency rule language published after comments, which will determine whether stakeholder lawsuits become likely ^{[5] [4]}. Available sources do not mention any concluded court case or enacted congressional law since 2024 that definitively overturned ED’s proposed definition ^{[7] [2]}.

Limitations: this analysis relies only on the set of documents you provided, which emphasize proposals, stakeholder reactions and negotiated‑rulemaking concerns; they document legal risk and heavy advocacy but do not include a final judicial decision or a specific post‑2024 congressional statute directly addressing the ED definition ^{[4] [2]}.