I don’t see much on Arizona State’s Edson College of Nursing so I thought I’d offer some feedback. We looked into nursing programs in our state of California and there were 2-year waits for the community college route. The UCs had nurses taking classes with pre-med students.
My daughter graduated from ASU and has been working for a couple of years as a nurse and loves her job. She feels that ASU prepared her well. The GPA for admittance to the BSN Direct Admissions program was only 3.2 GPA at the time but the students were obviously 3.7+ GPAs. Nursing is a difficult program at any reputable college and she did find ASU’s program rigorous at times but the administration had her back. She had an issue with something and they set up a meeting and addressed it immediately, listened to her input; it was impressive for such a large university. I think the president, Michael Crow, who is a businessman, runs the college well and he wants everyone to succeed so his leadership trickles down to the program leaders. Taylor Place (the newer dorm for nursing students) is in Phoenix where the classes are. There is a Chic-Fil-A, Starbuck’s and Panda Express at the bottom level of the dorm. We were impressed that on Move-In Day, there was a disc jockey, snacks, water, and movers to help us move into the dorm. It was well organized!
Downtown Phoenix is boring so my daughter moved to be near the main campus in Tempe, near the restaurants. She took the shuttle to Phoenix until we bought her a car. Nursing students need a car in their second year (or carpool) to go to hospitals once a week. The general ed classes in the first two years were easy for her. She attended a top college prep high school so she was prepared for rigor. Some of the nursing classes were rigorous, especially the upperclassmen classes and she hired tutors online from wyzant. She didn’t find everyone collaborative, everyone was just trying to survive and it was a busy schedule. Some people got into groups and cheated but she worked solo. In the upperclassmen courses, they need to get at least a “B-” to pass the class. There were times where she thought she wouldn’t pass but would pull through narrowly. It was a very busy 4 years. Some people did drop out. The professors were nice people. The administration discontinued some things that were busy work and changed some courses. As per President Michael Crow, they are always evaluating programs and innovating. He has brought many restaurants to campus so that the students have places to hangout.
ASU has a high rate of passing for the NCLEX standardized nursing exam and she passed on her first try despite being bad at standardized tests. Students study for the exam but ASU also prepared her well. She is working in Arizona, as she enjoys the people.