Thank you! I will check out Fairfield.
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Glad I have come across this page. Iām a new user, parent of S26. Any information and help during this process will be amazing. Iām pretty sure we can all agree.
I will be posting some stats later on this week, our current college list and recent visits.
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Great medical facilities but a commuter type environment
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Youāre correct about the commuter vibe. [At the risk of posting too much personal info, we live in the city.] My D26 is not interested in any of the local nursing programs (Loyola, DePaul, UIC) despite good hospitals here. She would actually love a flagship state school ā rah, rah, school spirit, etc. ā but unfortunately our closest/in-state options (UIUC and UW-Madison) do not have direct admit. So we are casting a wider netā¦
Anyone planning nursing visits this spring? I just booked a āspring breakā east coast college trip for us. Most of the schools fall into the reach category ā but I will report back!
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My Son 2026 in a very challenging Catholic HS in NJ has:
3.98 UWGPA
9 Honors classes
Varsity Baseball
Competitive baseball for over 10+years
Over 50+ hours of Volunteer/shadowing Drās and Nurses in ER (as a current Junior and hours still adding up)
PSAT 1260 (even though may go test optional) he takes SAT in March
National Honors Society
School mentorship program for underclassman
Over 100 hours at local Boys and Girls club helping middle school kids with homework and projects
BLS Certification
Iām hoping these stats will be good for some DA Nursing programs.
Our list;
Rutgers*** 
Fairfield
UConn ***
UDel***
USF
FSU
Pitt
UTK
SLU
Binghampton
FAU
Seton Hall University - Visited (he was unimpressed, but still applying)
Minnesota Twin Cities
WVU
Umass Amherst
BC (super reach)
A few that we think are State āsafetiesā
Montclair - Visited (was good)
TCNJ
Any info anyone has on these schools and stats. Please feel free to comment. We want to prep for application process and add/remove colleges by mid summer.
Thank you.
*** visited and liked program
favorites so far
Will be visiting Fairfield, Sacred Heart University and Binghamton by mid February. TCNJ in March. Will keep everyone posted on those visits.
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We are visiting UConn and BC in March! From your list, we have also visited UMN-TC and Pitt. My D26 really liked the clinical opportunities and curriculum at Pitt.
Tell me more about the Florida schools on your list! Which did you pick and why?
We picked a few schools in Florida for better weather, top #100 with USF and FSU, high nclex pass rates, tuition is much less even with OOS. Also, just casting a bigger net with DA, making sure we have options.
We arenāt sure if all on his list will be on there come mid July. But this is our initial list. Hopefully with some insights of the members here, we can make better decisions on the final list.
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@Shellg - we really liked Belmont Universityās nursing program when we visited. The nursing students there seemed happy and kept talking to us about how caring the instructors were. With Belmontās new medical college, they were talking about the hope to have some interaction with the medical students as well. A lot of the clinicals seemed to be at Vanderbilt University Medical Center. Nashville is a great city and and it seems the Belmont students often interacted socially with those at Vanderbilt which is just down the road. My daughter didnāt end up going there but it was in her top 5.
Marquette was another one we really enjoyed. It was the furthest away but we both really liked the vibe of the city and enjoyed the campus. It seemed that every college was opening up a new nursing building when we were touring this time last year.
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We toured Belmont with my son who is a music studentā¦we loved the school (he went elsewhere) so we are excited to bring her and see the Nursing side! Our friendās son is a Nursing student and loves the program. What other programs did you see and like? We are in CT and she really wants to stay in New England but would probably do Belmont because itās an easy trip.
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Our very first tour with D26 was Marquette (both nursing tour and general info session/tour). We were also impressed. My D likes an urban campus and the clinicals were reportedly very close. The program seemed extremely well established and integrated into the hospital system in Milwaukee. (Our general tour guide had just accepted an offer as a pediatric neurology nurse at the Childrenās Hospital there). Brand new nursing building too! I did a longer review of our tour at Marquette on another nursing thread which can probably be found by searching my older posts.
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I just went through the process with my D25, Iām happy to share what we learned in the process! We visited the following schools:
University of Pennsylvania - daughter admitted ED and attending
Villanova University
University of Pittsburgh
University of Delaware
Boston College
Georgetown University
UVA
Ohio State University
Case Western Reserve University
University of Michigan
Marquette University
University of Wisconsin
Looked at but didnāt visit - many had online info sessions:
Creighton University
University of Indiana
Rutgers
Purdue University
Iowa
UNC Chapel Hill
Emory
Northeastern
SLU
University of Washington
My daughter volunteered at our local childrenās hospital through high school and is on the junior volunteer board, completed a 40 hour nursing shadow the summer before junior year, completed her CNA the summer before senior year, also attended Ohio State Nursing camp summer before senior year. Other than nursing related activities, she tutors, dances, and had very good grades and a 34 ACT.
If you search posts about last year, I posted notes from many of the virtual sessions we attended that had information about class sizes, etc.
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Look at university of Delaware! Iām a current student there and I really love the school. As long as they donāt mind not having a great football program, the school has a very traditional college experience.
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What is the Gameday culture like there? D26 is def applying but wants the fun Saturday/tailgating experience. Even if the team isn;t great, is there school spirit and do you go to the games?
In case anyone is interested, Emmanuel College in Boston is running its āSummer Nursing Academyā for the second year this summer. I just registered D26! Here is the info:
July 14-18 (M-F)
She was looking for something like this but all the options she found required a flight or the timing did not work with her summer schedule. This is perfect and she is super excited. Wanted to pass along the info to anyone who might be interested.
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There is definitely some school spirit, not as much as a big 10 or SEC school though. I went to the first football game and the parents weekend football game, and thereās definitely tailgating then. Other than that I didnāt go to any games. I canāt speak for the spring sports since Iām a freshman, but I know lacrosse is very big at UD so there may be some more spirit around that?
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The schools we visited (we live in NC) were the following (Iāll put an * by the ones she applied to - she got into all except Duke):
UVA
UNC-CH* - not direct admit
UNC-Charlotte - not direct admit
UNC-Wilmington* - not direct admit
Clemson*
USC (South Carolina)* - direct admit only for Honors students (~20-25 students)
Elon - great school and program but out in the middle of nowhere according to my daughter
Mercer
Augusta
Marquette*
Duke (no nursing)*
Denison (no nursing)*
Rhodes (no nursing)*
Univ Pittsburgh*
Miami Univ Ohio*
Xavier University*
Belmont University*
Emory
Vanderbilt - no nursing
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Great list! We have a junior in HS and several of these are on her list. Is Emory direct admit?
I never got a straight answer. You apply to the School of nursing the fall semester of your sophomore year. Everything I have read is that as long as you have met the requirements and have a 3.0 GPA, you are guaranteed admission if you are either an Emory or Oxford (their small liberal arts campus for the first 2 years) student. So not officially a direct admit - but essentially it sounds like it is. My daughter really liked Emory and was planning to apply to the Oxford campus but had application fatigue so chose not to.
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Someone weāre close to took the non-direct admit path and had excellent results. Letās face it, nursing school admissions, both direct, and non-direct, can be very competitive. Hopefully the pathway described below will help someone reach their end goal of becoming a nurse.
A woman we know wanted to become a flight nurse when she was graduating high school. She chose to go to a non-direct admission school. At this university sophomores apply to the nursing program for junior year admission. It is very competitive, with a strict admissions limit per class. Her freshman year she witnessed the stress some sophomore students were experiencing, so she chose a different path.
The first step she took was to join the local rescue squad in her college town. She had obtained her EMT certification as a senior in high school. During her undergrad years she responded to hundreds of calls, earned her paramedic certification, joined the technical rescue team, became an EMT/paramedic preceptor and held various supervisory roles. The real world experience she gained from this particular pathway benefitted her then, and still does now.
Academically she changed her major from nursing to health sciences. At this school the nursing pre-requisite courses are almost identical to the health sciences pre-requisites and electives. She was able to get that foundation without the added stress of the competition inherent to the BSN program. She graduated with honors with a Health Sciences degree with certain additional concentrations.
After graduation she enrolled in an accelerated BSN program at another university. In 15 months she earned her ABSN. She is quick to point out that her experience with emergent patient care at the rescue squad gave her a big leg up in her ABSN program. She graduated in the top of her class and immediately went to work in a cardiac ICU at a Level 1 trauma center. In her spare time she continues to volunteer at the rescue squad to keep her skills sharp.
As in most aspects of life, there isnāt one specifically prescribed pathway. Sometimes skill and will wins out in the end. The world needs more nurses, no matter their progression to certification. Regardless of the avenue you pursue, I appreciate your dedication and sacrifice for your future patients. Good luck.
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