{"id":515,"date":"2026-06-29T09:38:56","date_gmt":"2026-06-29T13:38:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/updateeducation\/?p=515"},"modified":"2026-06-29T09:38:58","modified_gmt":"2026-06-29T13:38:58","slug":"federal-court-stays-department-of-educations-narrowed-definition-of-professional-degree-for-graduate-student-loan-limits","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/updateeducation\/2026\/06\/29\/federal-court-stays-department-of-educations-narrowed-definition-of-professional-degree-for-graduate-student-loan-limits\/","title":{"rendered":"Federal Court Stays Department of Education&#8217;s Narrowed Definition of &#8220;Professional Degree&#8221; for Graduate Student Loan Limits"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">By <a href=\"https:\/\/www.duanemorris.com\/attorneys\/tonyguida.html\">Anthony J. Guida Jr.<\/a>,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.duanemorris.com\/attorneys\/katherinedbrodie.html\">Katherine D. Brodie<\/a>,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.duanemorris.com\/attorneys\/jenniferdemay.html\">Jen DeMay<\/a>,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.duanemorris.com\/attorneys\/kristinagill.html\">Kristina Gill<\/a> and\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.duanemorris.com\/attorneys\/johnmsimpson.html\">John M. Simpson<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">On June 24, 2026\u2014just one week before the July 1, 2026, effective date of the new student loan limits\u2014the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia issued a significant ruling in\u00a0<em>American Association of Nurse Practitioners v. McMahon<\/em>\u00a0and the consolidated case\u00a0<em>PA Education Association v. Department of Education<\/em>, staying in part implementation of the U.S. Department of Education\u2019s new regulatory definition of \u201cprofessional degree.\u201d<a href=\"https:\/\/fsapartners.ed.gov\/knowledge-center\/library\/electronic-announcements\/2026-01-16\/program-participation-agreement-signature-requirements\"><\/a>\u00a0The stay prevents the Department from enforcing its narrowed definition, which would have limited the categories of graduate students eligible for higher federal student loan limits under the Working Families Tax Cuts Act (also known as the \u201cOne Big Beautiful Bill Act\u201d), pending resolution of the litigation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Read the full <em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.duanemorris.com\/alerts\/navigating_uncertainty_after_federal_court_stays_department_educations_narrowed_definition_0626.html\">Alert<\/a> <\/em>on the Duane Morris LLP website.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Anthony J. Guida Jr.,\u00a0Katherine D. Brodie,\u00a0Jen DeMay,\u00a0Kristina Gill and\u00a0John M. Simpson On June 24, 2026\u2014just one week before the July 1, 2026, effective date of the new student loan limits\u2014the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia issued a significant ruling in\u00a0American Association of Nurse Practitioners v. McMahon\u00a0and the consolidated case\u00a0PA Education Association &hellip; <\/p>\n<p class=\"link-more\"><a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/updateeducation\/2026\/06\/29\/federal-court-stays-department-of-educations-narrowed-definition-of-professional-degree-for-graduate-student-loan-limits\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;Federal Court Stays Department of Education&#8217;s Narrowed Definition of &#8220;Professional Degree&#8221; for Graduate Student Loan Limits&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":376,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"ppma_author":[197,181,270,180,182],"class_list":["post-515","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"authors":[{"term_id":197,"user_id":376,"is_guest":0,"slug":"tguida","display_name":"Anthony J. Guida Jr.","avatar_url":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/updateeducation\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/44\/2019\/06\/guidatony-125x150.jpg","author_category":"","last_name":"Guida Jr.","first_name":"Anthony J.","job_title":"","user_url":"https:\/\/www.duanemorris.com\/attorneys\/tonyguida.html","description":"<a href=\"https:\/\/www.duanemorris.com\/attorneys\/tonyguida.html\">Read Tony's bio.<\/a>"},{"term_id":181,"user_id":375,"is_guest":0,"slug":"kdbrodie","display_name":"Katherine D. Brodie","avatar_url":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/updateeducation\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/44\/2019\/06\/brodiekatherine-125x150.jpg","author_category":"","last_name":"Brodie","first_name":"Katherine D.","job_title":"","user_url":"https:\/\/www.duanemorris.com\/attorneys\/katherinedbrodie.html","description":"<a href=\"https:\/\/www.duanemorris.com\/attorneys\/katherinedbrodie.html\">Read Katherine's bio.<\/a>"},{"term_id":270,"user_id":620,"is_guest":0,"slug":"jddemay","display_name":"Jennifer D. DeMay","avatar_url":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/updateeducation\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/44\/2023\/05\/demayjennifer-100x100.jpg","author_category":"","last_name":"DeMay","first_name":"Jennifer","job_title":"","user_url":"https:\/\/www.duanemorris.com\/attorneys\/jenniferdemay.html","description":"<A HREF=\"https:\/\/www.duanemorris.com\/attorneys\/jenniferdemay.html\">Read Jennifer's Bio<\/a>"},{"term_id":180,"user_id":374,"is_guest":0,"slug":"kgill","display_name":"Kristina Gill","avatar_url":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/updateeducation\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/44\/2024\/01\/gillkristina-100x100.jpg","author_category":"","last_name":"Gill","first_name":"Kristina","job_title":"","user_url":"https:\/\/www.duanemorris.com\/attorneys\/kristinagill.html","description":"<a href=\"https:\/\/www.duanemorris.com\/attorneys\/kristinagill.html\">Read Kristina's bio.<\/a>"},{"term_id":182,"user_id":317,"is_guest":0,"slug":"jmsimpson","display_name":"John M. Simpson","avatar_url":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/updateeducation\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/44\/2019\/09\/simpsonjohn-125x150.jpg","author_category":"","last_name":"Simpson","first_name":"John M.","job_title":"","user_url":"https:\/\/www.duanemorris.com\/attorneys\/johnmsimpson.html","description":"<a href=\"https:\/\/www.duanemorris.com\/attorneys\/johnmsimpson.html\">Read John's bio.<\/a>"}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/updateeducation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/515","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/updateeducation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/updateeducation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/updateeducation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/376"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/updateeducation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=515"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/updateeducation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/515\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":517,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/updateeducation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/515\/revisions\/517"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/updateeducation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=515"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/updateeducation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=515"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/updateeducation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=515"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/updateeducation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/ppma_author?post=515"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}