Yale has a plan after Trump nixed a key student-loan program

Trump is eliminating the Grad PLUS student-loan program for graduate and professional students. Yale University said it would introduce a replacement option for its students. The student-loan borrowing and repayment changes are set to go into effect in July 2026. Graduate and professional students could soon find themselves with more limited student-loan options . Yale has a plan. The Yale School of Public Health posted on LinkedIn last week that it will "soon introduce a replacement loan option" for student-loan borrowers who are affected by President Donald Trump's plan to eliminate the Grad PLUS program as part of his "big beautiful" spending legislation. Grad PLUS allowed graduate and professional students to borrow up to the full cost of attendance for their programs. Trump's legislation eliminated the program and implemented new borrowing caps: a $100,000 lifetime cap for graduate students and a $200,000 lifetime cap for professional students. Yale said that its new program would "offer comparable, if not more competitive, loan terms compared to previous Grad PLUS loans," adding that more details will be available soon. The university did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Business Insider. In addition to Yale, Bloomberg reported that other schools , such as Duke University and the University of Pennsylvania, are also working to establish financing options for students pursuing advanced degrees, including working with private lenders for additional financing. Education policy experts previously told Business Insider that limiting borrowing for advanced degrees could push students to either forgo their programs or turn to the private loan market, which could have riskier terms with higher interest rates. Trump's Department of Education is set to roll out the student-loan borrowing changes in July 2026. It will affect new students. Existing borrowers will be able to retain their financing options. The department is also introducing its new Repayment Assistance Plan in July, which is intended to replace existing income-driven repayment plans. Some advocates and Democratic lawmakers have previously expressed concern with the elimination of Grad PLUS and the new caps on borrowing for advanced degrees. The Department of Education proposed a new definition of "professional," compiling a list of 10 programs, like medicine and dentistry, that would qualify for the higher borrowing cap. Earlier this month, over 140 bipartisan lawmakers signed onto a letter urging the department to revise the limits to include advanced nursing programs in the professional degree designation. "Classifying these programs as graduate programs would result in these students having to take out additional student loans to cover the remainder of their tuition, which will limit the ability for students to complete their advanced degree," the letter said. Ellen Keast, the department's press secretary for education, told Business Insider that "we expect that institutions charging tuition rates well above market prices will consider lowering tuition thanks to these historic reforms."

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