Emancipatory knowing in nursology is defined as “The human capacity to be aware of and critically reflect on the social, cultural, and political status quo and to determine how and why it came to be that way” (Chinn et al., 2026, p. 9). Emancipatory knowing is regarded as the praxis of nursology. As such, emancipatory knowing represents calls to action (Lindell & Chinn, 2024).
NOW is a time of great need for a call to action to investigate and defeat in any way that each reader of this blog can. This is a call to engage in a dialogue of emancipatory knowing about the recent US Department of Education proposal to change the classification of nursing, public health, and other health professions graduate degrees from professional degrees to higher education degrees. This change in category will substantially reduce the annual and total amount of funding for the faculty loan program.
As readers of nursology.net know, the practice of these health professions is based on knowledge, which is the definition of a profession. To deny that is an insult, based on ignorance of the US Department of Education personnel, to all nursologists and other members of the health professions. What is certain to be a negative effect of change in category, with concomitant change in funds available for the faculty loan program will, of course, have a cascading effect of fewer nursologists prepared to teach nursology to undergraduate and graduate students, which in turn will decrease the number of nursologists, thereby severely exacerbating the current shortage of nursologists in practice and nursologists who are faculty, which in turn will severely exacerbate access to health care, which in turn will exacerbate the severity of acute and chronic diseases, which in turn will result in the death of many persons.
Please refer to these links for more information about the US Department of Education proposal.
- The Department of Education Proposes Excluding Nursing from List of “Professional Degrees”
- Understanding the Proposed Federal Loan Caps
I implore each reader of this blog to engage in emancipatory knowing by taking these actions– contact the US Department of Education, your state congressional delegation, and the local and national media to alert them to the major impact the category change will have on citizens of the United States.
References
Chinn, P. L., Canty, L, & Mkandawire-Valhmu, L. (2026). Knowledge development in nursing: Theory and process (12th ed.). Elsevier. (see https://nursology.net/resources/books/knowledge-development-in-nursing/)
Lindell, D., & Chinn, P. L. (2024, January 19). Emancipatory and Sociopolitical Knowing. nursology.net. https://nursology.net/patterns-of-knowing-in-nursing/emancipatory-knowing/
I agree with you completely, Jacqui, and would add that the ANA’s response to this initiative reinforces the DOE’s argument to declassify nursing as a profession: “(The ANA)…arguing strongly that advanced nursing education must remain accessible if we want a strong, diverse, and effective health workforce.” It shows how deeply embedded our profession is in defining itself by task and practice rather than being grounded in a knowledge base specific to- and generated by- PhD prepared nurses. The ability to generate discipline-specific, new knowledge and theory is a critical criterion for designation as a profession, and we are woefully short on PhD nursologists. Less than 1% of nurses hold a PhD in the US, and it is that shortage (NOT a workforce shortage) that is endangering our ‘professional’ status.
[https://onsitepublicmedia.substack.com/p/the-department-of-education-proposes]
Robin, Thank you very much for your comment. I have written another blog about this issue, to be posted soon. I point out that the issue really is education required for entry into practice. We are wedded to undergraduate education as entry into practice, whereas the DOE identified professions that have graduate education as entry into practice. So, if we continue to accept undergraduate education (diploma, associate degree, baccalaureate degree) as entry into practice, we are correctly classified as higher education. Thus our call to action should be about amount of funding–higher education and profession classifications should have the same amount of funding, at the current profession level (or above, of course)!
Absolutely. Pharmacists successfully dealt with this same issue in the last few decades, moving from the baccalaureate as entry into practice to the masters degree and now the doctorate required for entry into professional practice. The discipline of Physical Therapy has also addressed the same challenge, now requiring a doctorate for professional practice. The implications of this proposal go beyond educational funding…our status as a profession- internally and publicly- is at stake.
Robin, Thank you for your second comment. I recall being rather embarrassed that when my husband needed home health care, the RN had only an associate degree and no interest in obtaining a baccalaureate degree (despite my urging her to do so; her reply is that she would not be doing anything different in her practice; I did not bother to reply), whereas the physical therapist had a doctor of PT degree, which was evident in the way in which she worked with John and included me. The RN did not even let me change my husband’s wound dressing, although she knew I also am a RN. So sad and disappointing when RNs focus only on skills and exclude families!