Though many Americans see exclusion from the Department of Education's list of "professional" graduate degrees as a loss of status and access to higher education, others see it as an opportunity to finally get ballooning student loan debt under control.
The Trump administration has updated which majors fall under its definition of “professional” degrees that are eligible for higher student loan limits. Only 11 made the cut, and many people were quick to point out degrees such as nursing, accounting, architecture and physical therapy were excluded.
Opponents said the proposed guidelines, which must go through a comment period before becoming finalized early next year, would prevent people from being able to afford pursuing the excluded professions.
But some lenders say the lower limits, coupled with the Education Department eliminating unlimited Graduate PLUS loans for the cost of attendance and lowering the cap for Parent PLUS loans, may end up helping reduce student debt for many borrowers. Debt will drop if students must give more consideration to their budgets and degree costs and enrollments drop at expensive schools. Expensive schools may have to find ways to cut their prices to compete, they say.
