Graduate students now have a limit on how much money they can borrow, leaving those who rely on loans to reassess whether their career goals are still feasible.
Students pursuing professional paths, like those in law or medical schools, are limited to $50,000 a year in loans, with a lifetime limit of $200,000. These limits go into effect July 1, 2026, under President Trump's budget bill signed into law earlier this month.
Hawaiʻi-native Sherie Agcaoili is on a pre-med path at the University of Southern California. She said it’s her dream to come home for medical school to eventually serve her community. But now, that hope may be out of reach.
“It makes students unable to pursue that dream as much as we would like,” Agcaoili said. “It’s a very scary and uncertain time.”
At the UH William S. Richardson School of Law, full-time students on the resident tuition rate pay roughly $23,000 a year, and out-of-state students pay about $45,000.
Looking at only base tuition rates, the new loan limit seems like it should be more than enough to cover costs, but not exactly.
“Our residents’ total cost of attendance is a little over $51,000, and a true nonresident is just shy of $75,000,” said Tyler Cegler, the director of enrollment management at the law school. “When you’re not sure if there’s going to be the funding to help, you start looking at other options.”
He noted that the price of pursuing a professional degree includes a laundry list of additional costs. He tells prospective full-time students to account for nearly $800 in fees, $20,000 for food and housing, about $1,500 for books and supplies, and roughly $5,000 for additional personal expenses each year.
Kevin Kaneshiro is the scholarship director and financial aid counselor at the UH John A. Burns School of Medicine.
He worries that this daunting financial commitment will be too high a hurdle for many students, leaving only those who come from a place of wealth as prospective students.
“They’re going to be asked to commit to these huge finances that they can’t afford, so they either abandon that path or they go to the mainland where they can afford it, then our doctor shortage in this state gets even worse,” Kaneshiro said.
Agcaoili added that these loan limits will create a ripple effect that turns medical students toward higher-paying practices, like surgery, rather than filling the areas with the most severe shortages, like family medicine. She believes this affordability gap will create a medical field that isn’t representative of the communities it serves.
“It’s more than likely that we won’t be seeing medical professionals from all walks of life, and that’s what you want to see in medicine,” Agcaoili said.
“You want to be represented by someone who has similar struggles to you. And so when you have these doctors that are only coming from the top 5%, medicine is not as effective as it could be.”
How much do students depend on loans?
In the 2023-2024 school year, the law school reported that over half of its students took out federal loans. The average loan was just shy of $32,000, but more than 20 students took out a loan that exceeded $50,000, which would no longer be possible.
Cegler noted that the results of the limit changes will “mirror the broader economic inequalities that already exist,” placing additional barriers in front of those who don’t come from a financially abundant place.
JABSOM saw comparable numbers, with 45% of its student body borrowing money, and roughly 60% leaving the school with student loan debt. The highest debt reported was over $300,000.
A key player in this mix is the Direct PLUS Loan program, which was another form of financial aid that supplied students with loans that equaled up to their total cost of attendance. The Grad PLUS section of the program was eliminated completely under the megabill.
About 16% of the JABSOM class relied on the Grad PLUS loan to fund their educations.
“If they don’t come from a place of wealth and they’re getting denied these other private bank loans, a lot of these students are just going to give up on their dream,” Kaneshiro at JABSOM said.
What's being done now
Kaneshiro said the medical school tries to cushion the cost, stating that, on average, 93% of a JABSOM class of 77 students are on some form of scholarship.
Similarly, Cegler noted that the law school recently revamped its scholarship program to allow for better disbursement of funds.
Previously, law students were eligible for either a $5,000 or a $10,000 scholarship. Now, the school has created a roughly 20-tier system that adjusts scholarship amounts based on need and a holistic assessment of the student.
“This isn’t a loan or a grant — this is money for the student from the school so that they can pursue this education,” Cegler said.
“We’re used to being 2,500 miles away from anything and anywhere, so we have to lean and depend on each other to create the communities that we want here. We need to help them afford to learn in Hawaiʻi if we want to help them stay in Hawaiʻi."
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