After ten years of considering myself a professional, last week the Board of Education announced that nursing is no longer categorized as a “professional degree.”
Let that sink in.
For over a decade, I have devoted my life to mastering a discipline rooted in science, ethics, critical thinking, and human connection. I have spent countless nights studying pathophysiology, pharmacology, leadership theory, research methods, quality improvement, public health, and advanced clinical practice. I have stood at bedsides where life, death, and dignity intersect in ways only a nurse can understand.
I have practiced under pressure, made rapid and complex clinical judgments, and carried the emotional weight of others’ pain, fear, uncertainty, and hope. I have held hands, advocated fiercely, stabilized crises, and provided comfort when medicine had little left to offer.
And now, with the stroke of a pen and a single policy change, the profession I have lived and breathed is being reframed as something “less than”—as if the work we do is not rigorous enough, not skilled enough, not professional enough to count.
This is more than a bureaucratic update.
It is a dismissal of the very foundation on which modern nursing stands.