Student loan legislation could hurt religious college programs, Christian leaders say
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Christian college presidents are sounding the alarm over new federal rules they say will cripple Christian higher education and penalize students who pursue religious careers.
The Department of Education’s proposal, known as the Student Study and Attribution System (STATS), introduces an income premium test to determine eligibility for federal loans for college programs. The law — an implementation of the One Big Beautiful Bill passed last year — is designed to protect students from low-income degrees.
Under the new metric, a bachelor’s degree program “fails” if its graduates do not earn more than the median salary of a 25- to 34-year-old high school graduate. For degree programs, the benchmark is the median income of similar adults with only a bachelor’s degree.
The Department of Education plans to use IRS and US Census data to assess this benefit four years after a student completes their degree.
The Trump administration is introducing FAFSA’s real-time fraud detection tool to combat ghost student scams tied to fictitious or stolen identities. (Getty Images)
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“Programs that consistently fail to provide students with a reliable return on investment will lose their student loans, and in some cases, Pell Grants,” the Department of Education said in a statement on April 17. Schools will be required to disclose that the program is a failing program and stop enrolling new students.
However, Christian college leaders have warned the laws would disproportionately disrupt religious programs and increase the nation’s shortage of chaplains, according to a new report by Christianity Today.
“It’s a real threat to the future of theological higher education in the US—I don’t think that’s an exaggeration,” Philip Dearborn, head of the Association for Biblical Higher Education, told CT. “It came out of left field.”
According to Dearborn, 21 presidents from Christian colleges met with lawmakers in Washington last month to lobby for the legislation.
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“Financial results are important, but they don’t completely measure how important education is,” David Hoag, president of the Council for Christian Colleges & Universities (CCCU), told Christianity Today.
The report cited the government’s own estimates that religious programs would be among the hardest hit, predicting that 89% of religious bachelor’s degrees and 53% of religious bachelor’s degrees would fail under the new metric.
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Critics also said in the report that the regulation creates an “unfair” experience gap by comparing a recent college graduate to a 34-year-old high school graduate who may have 16 years of work experience.
The Department of Education says that if more than half of a college’s Title IV and HEA state aid is tied up in “failing” programs, the entire institution could be put into receivership.
Secretary of Education Linda McMahon testifies before a House Appropriations subcommittee budget hearing at the US Department of Education on Capitol Hill in Washington on May 21, 2025. (Rod Lamkey Jr./AP)
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Christianity Today noted that other programs, such as culinary arts and music training, face similar risks under the new laws.
“If people want to get their degrees in these areas, but don’t qualify for financial aid, that will have a big impact on religious workers,” said Frank Yamada, head of the Association of Theological Schools, in a statement cited in the report. “In many Christian cultures now, there are often more job openings or calls available than there are people who want to fill those calls.”
A spokesperson for the Department of Education told Fox News Digital that it could not comment on specific aspects of the proposed accountability rule during the public comment period but would consider the comments as it develops the final rule.
“The Trump Administration’s proposed accountability framework is based on common sense: if higher education programs aren’t leaving graduates better off, taxpayers shouldn’t be subsidizing them,” Education Secretary Nicholas Kent said in an earlier statement. “This consensus-based framework will drive meaningful change in postsecondary education, ending years of regulatory whiplash and addressing the student debt that has left so many students behind.”
