Nursing and the DOE's New Proposed Definition of a Professional Degree.

The U.S. Department of Education (DOE) has proposed new rules that would narrow the definition of a "professional degree" for the purposes of federal student loans, potentially excluding graduate nursing, physician assistant (PA), and public health programs from specific higher loan limits (Google AI). There are many misconceptions around the educational requirements for various nursing degree programs. In this episode of the Love n' Leary podcast we talk with Kathryn Shaffer, EdD, RN, MSN, CNE, nurse educator and innovator, about the proposed new definition, the effect it would have on student loans for graduate nurses, the rigor of what it really takes to obtain a degrees in nursing, and why there are so many misconceptions about nursing programs. We also talk, as we do in almost all of our episodes, about what we can do as nurses to use our voices to amplify nursing, this time focused on amplifying nursing as a "professional degree" program.