POUGHKEEPSIE — A U.S. Bankruptcy Court judge on Wednesday authored a stunning decision that may make it easier for student loan borrowers to file for bankruptcy.

Cecelia G. Morris, chief bankruptcy judge for the Southern District of New York, ruled in favor of Kevin Jared Rosenberg, who sought to erase more than $220,000 in loans accumulated during his undergraduate and law school years.

Morris argued in the sharply worded document that courts have misapplied "the Brunner test," a three-pronged standard for determining whether college debt poses an "undue hardship" on the borrower, which is notoriously difficult to pass.

"Brunner has received a lot of criticism for creating too high of a burden for most bankruptcy petitioners to meet ... The harsh results that often are associated with Brunner are actually the result of cases interpreting Brunner," Morris wrote.

The question of whether student loan borrowers can file for bankruptcy has been debated in federal courts for decades.

In the 1970s, Congress exempted federal student loans from discharge in bankruptcy — except in extreme circumstances — amid concerns that some were exploiting the system to avoid repayment. In 2005, the exemption was expanded to private college loans as well. However, there are different views on what constitutes an "undue burden."

Critics say that the 32-year-old Brunner criteria, which originated in the Southern District of New York and has since been adopted by federal circuit courts in other states, has been interpreted too narrowly, deterring most former college students from seeking loan forgiveness.

In the last few years, bankruptcy lawyers all over the country have been challenging the exemption, seeking new avenues for borrowers to find relief from crippling student debt, but few have been successful.

Morris' decision is likely to be appealed by loan service providers, but if it is affirmed by the higher court, it could have a rippling impact in other parts of the nation, according to Peter Frank, a bankruptcy lawyer from Kingston.

"All of us have been discouraged from attempting to discharge student loans because it appeared that the law was a wall too high to climb for most debtors other than those with severe disabilities," Frank said. "If the district court affirms Chief Morris' order, there will be a lot more filers for bankruptcy all over the country."

According to the Brunner standard, to have college debt discharged in a bankruptcy proceeding, borrowers must demonstrate that making loan payments would prevent them from maintaining an acceptable living standard. They also must show that their financial condition is likely to last for most of the remaining loan period and prove that they made a “good faith” effort to repay the loans.

Morris, in her ruling, illustrated how many cases have added punitive standards to the Brunner test not contained in the original decision.

"Those retributive dicta were then applied and reapplied so frequently in the context of Brunner that they have subsumed the actual language of the Brunner test. They have become a quasi-standard of mythic proportions so much so that most people ... believe it impossible to discharge student loans," Morris wrote. "This Court will not participate in perpetuating these myths."