since my previous post may have felt like a bucket of cold water, let me suggest some positive paths forward.
First off, don’t make any concrete plans until you actually have experience this summer volunteering in healthcare. Maybe it will convince you that nursing is absolutely right for you, but maybe you’ll find it isn’t the fit you had hoped.
Next, if your goal after that is still to be a nurse then explore paths that get you there. This probably means casting aside any notions of “dream schools”, you need a program that will accept you. Your preference in 4-year schools should be direct-admit programs.
Since 4-year nursing programs are very competitive, there are alternate paths. The end goal is to end up with a BSN, the pay is better than for just an RN and increasingly it is a requirement for promotion.
One option is to going to a 4-year and taking the pre-nursing program and then applying for the BSN program there (as well as applying to xfer to other colleges with a BSN). In fact you could look up what nursing schools require to transfer in and take those classes at most 4-year schools, you don’t have to initially enroll at a school with a School of Nursing. But if you don’t get into a BSN program after 2 years you are kinda out of luck, and admission is quite competitive.
Instead of a 4-year program at one school you could get an RN at a community college (an ADN degree) and then go to one of the RN->BSN programs. Look for a good NCLEX pass rate at the CC. I know nurses that have done this, RN->BSN programs tend to be easier to get into. See http://www.rn.ca.gov/education/rntobsn.shtml for a list. Many are part-time and/or online, but some are campus based. Fullerton, for example, offers both online and on-campus and says
If you go the CC->BSN path you are a RN and are highly likely to get a BSN if you continue, the downside is the college experience is not quite the same as the 4-year path.