As a nurse with a long and fulfilling career of 52 years — 18 of them in Nevada — I’d certainly consider myself a professional. 

The Trump administration seems to think otherwise. The Department of Education is preparing to declassify nursing as a “professional degree.” The department says this is to comply with new limits on federal student loans for graduate degrees in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act. I say it’s a slap in the face to the nation’s nearly 5 million registered nurses (RNs) who earned the respected RN designation through rigorous education and training. 

It’s much more than a designation, however. 

Registered nurses are the health care workers who help bring us into the world, care for us during our lifetime and aid us as we die. They look after us in our most vulnerable moments (and our most fearful and frustrated ones), often doing it with a genuine smile and caring touch. They offer a listening ear amid the rush of busy physicians and impersonal hospital bureaucracy. They perform these tasks with expertise and compassion — and often at considerable personal sacrifice. As RN and digital creator Arowosegbe Obafemi puts it, “Every time a nurse studies, a patient survives.”

Thus it’s little surprise that 3 in 4 Americans consider nurses highly honest and ethical, making nursing the most trusted of 23 professions rated in a 2024 Gallup poll. But as of July 1, nursing may no longer be recognized by the federal government as a professional degree.

Aside from insulting some of our most revered American workers, what does this downgrade mean for aspiring nurses or nurses who wish to advance their careers? It reduces their cap on federal student loans for advanced degrees from $200,000 to $100,000. With tuition and living costs typically exceeding $100,000 for many nursing programs, especially master’s degrees and doctorate degrees, nursing students are already struggling to make ends meet. 

This doesn’t count the intangible costs of a nursing education, which involves a grueling curriculum rooted in advanced physiology, pharmacology, pathophysiology, biochemistry, microbiology, informatics and diagnostics. Nursing students put their families and careers on hold for years, living on loans and whatever support they get from family. Nursing bachelor’s degree programs are a full-time commitment, as are advanced degree regimens. Accelerated nursing programs are even more demanding, a whirlwind of lectures, labs, clinicals and reports that can take up to 60 hours a week.

Ultimately, dropping nursing from the Department of Education’s list of professional degrees will result in fewer enrollments of new students and nurses pursuing advanced degrees. 

This is especially bad news for Nevada, where the nursing sector is already understaffed and efforts to address shortages through solutions such as interstate licensure compacts are at a frustrating impasse. Nursing is certainly a growing profession in the Silver State but it’s lagging behind our population growth. To meet per national per capita employment rates, we need an additional 14,000 nurses, from RNs to advanced practice registered nurses to licensed practical nurses to certified nursing assistants. Deficits such as these place oppressive demands on nurses and reduce the timeliness and quality of care received by patients. 

If it stands, the federal government’s exclusion of nursing from professional degree loan eligibility will reduce enrollment at a critical time when the median age of RNs is 46 years and — thanks to factors such as burnout, retirement and faculty shortages — the profession is already facing a projected shortage nationwide. 

The Department of Education claims its declassification of nursing education and capping loan limits will shrink student debt and bring down graduate program costs. If it’s serious about that goal, then capping student loan interest rates would immediately reduce the crushing debt load. 

Institutions of higher learning have seen their costs skyrocket largely because the availability of student loans allows them to spend and raise tuition virtually unchecked. Instead of targeting our health care workforce, the government should hold universities accountable by capping student loan interest rates and tuition increases, especially for essential programs such as nursing.

Fortunately, the Department of Education hasn’t made a final decision yet. If you want the nurses who serve you or your loved ones to be fully trained and professionally committed when they respond to the bedside help button, now is the time to speak up — before we have a dire emergency on our hands.

Julie D. Wagner is a registered nurse with more than five decades of experience. She also holds a doctorate in education.