'Affordable" Out of State Direct Admit Nursing Schools for A B Students from the west coast

College Majors Nursing Major
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I thought a thread like this would be useful for those looking for direct nursing choices that are at the more ‘affordable’ end of the spectrum. I know of course the term differs from family to family, and state to state.

Coming from CA there are very few in state options unless you have outstanding scores; and there are no direct admit WUE schools either - only Reno, Nevada offers WUE rates for its pre nursing program.

The few direct admit schools on the West Coast also tend to be more competitive and more expensive if you don’t have very high scores and don’t qualify for any financial aid. So here are some schools that for us looked like they would come in below $40,000 including room and board. She didn’t apply to them all.

I hope that others will add to the list to help others starting their search.

York College, PA (private) offered $10,000 a year merit which lowered tuition to about $15,000 plus room and board

Bradley, Illinois ( didn’t end up applying) but around $25k inc Room and Board)

PLU, Washington State - offers great merit ($25k in our case plus $3k for accommodation) Unfortunately not accepted into Nursing, only the college. Around $25 k total.

Vallapraiso , Indiana ( another Lutheran school that looked like it would offer good aid)

Westminster, Utah ( private school with generous aid). Small direct admit nursing program

Creighton, Nebraska

Xavier, Cincinnati

PASSHE Schools in PA (like Bloomsburg and IUP)

Stockton, New Jersey

The College of New Jersey ( believe they have some scholarships for students from CA and other oos)

Winona State , MN

Truman State, MO

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Great idea! We are in California and my D22 is leaning towards nursing. My husband and I are both nurses and I’m strongly encouraging her to pursue direct-entry.

University of Wyoming has a direct-admit option for qualified applicants. Wyoming is part of the WUE! It is fairly difficult to get the WUE rate at Wyoming but they do offer tiered auto-merit scholarships based on GPA/test scores. The OOS tuition is already relatively low.

The University of Utah (also a WUE school) has a form of direct-entry that they call the Nursing Early Assurance Program. The U is fairly generous with OOS scholarships and offers a one-year path to in-state residency which would bring the total cost down significantly.

@lass71 where is your daughter leaning on attending? And congrats on her acceptances!

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“there are no direct admit WUE schools either - only Reno, Nevada offers WUE rates for its pre nursing program.”

I don’t think this is correct - the University of Utah has a direct entry program (https://nursing.utah.edu/programs/bs/early-assurance/) and offers a limited number of WUE scholarships (https://financialaid.utah.edu/types-of-aid/scholarships/freshman/western-undergraduate-exchange.php) or the ability to earn instate status by staying the first summer (which is required for the NEAP program anyway). There is a large teaching hospital onsite.

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Thank you - I missed that Utah did offer WUE for nursing (annoyingly). Deadline to apply is 1st Nov for future students!

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@Banker1 will probably have some good ideas. His/her daughter went through this two years ago.

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My D ended up at SDSU but she visited many nursing programs out west such as Gonzaga, U of Portland, Seattle U, USF. While nursing hopefuls need to be nearly perfect to be admitted to the CA public schools that offer direct entry, many of the other schools she visited will offer admission including generous merit for the A- / B+ student. Check out this relevant thread from a couple years back - http://talk.qa.collegeconfidential.com/nursing-major/1968104-direct-nursing-admit-journey-for-a-california-a-b-student-p1.html

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Another school with direct admit nursing program is Arizona State. If your kids have mainly As/Bs and got admitted, they will most likely qualify for a scholarship of about $15.5K a year.

@Banker: I agree that the other colleges you mentioned (Gonzaga, U of Portland, USF, etc) give quite generous merit scholarships. However, they are still quite expensive net: ~$45k+ per year :frowning:

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Definitely make sure you understand the requirements at Arizona State. I believe it is a 3.5 GPA to keep your Direct Admit seat in the Nursing program. I think that is a high for a Freshman/Sophomore transitioning to college. Maybe its not a concern for all if they really like the school. But that GPA is approaching many non direct admit schools. Granted the # of applicants is usually a lot higher vs seats in non direct admit schools but there are some non direct admit schools where the applications vs seats are not that scary. Just something to consider.

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I agree with @arkymommy that it can be hard to retain your place at Arizona State because of high GPA requirement. That happened to a friend of a friend. I think it’s worth finding out from every school what their retention rate is , as some schools def use the first year or two to weed out students.
I just found out that Creighton is offering its latest intake of nursing students ( class graduating 2024) option to complete last two years in Phoenix , as they expand their campus there.

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I asked the Creighton representatives if my son could finish his Junior and Senior years at the Phoenix campus. They said it will not be ready for an undergraduate program by then:( Would have been nice if it was! As of now, expect to be in Omaha for all four years.

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Summary: A few things to consider in a nursing school: GPA requirement for admission may be too low (most have higher GPAs). Find out if classes are nursing students or pre-meds. See if there is a GPA requirement once accepted into the program. Visit the campus.

My daughter is a first year ASU Nursing student, Direct Admit to the BSN program (which avoids taking the TEAS and guarantees advancement to 3rd and 4th years of clinical nursing courses). Sure, the admission requirement is easy: 3.3 GPA, 24 ACT. We are from CA and she got $14,500/year merit scholarship for a 26 ACT/3.7 GPA from a college prep high school. I think the admit requirement is way too low. A 3.3 GPA student could not succeed in this program. 60% of the students flunk out of the Direct Admit status. Stats: total students: 498, average GPA: 3.61, average SAT 1172, average ACT: 23. As mentioned by others, they need to keep a 3.5 GPA every semester for the first two years (in critical classes) or they are dropped into the health sciences and can try to get back into the nursing program by taking the TEAS (standardized test) and continuing classes, competing with transfers and others. “After Direct Admission students are placed into the upper-division clinical nursing program, any remaining spaces will be offered to competitive applicants based on academic merit. There is no guarantee there will be remaining spaces available through the Competitive Application Process.” As everyone knows, Anatomy/Physiology is challenging, and it’s one class, not separate classes, which makes it more difficult. Don’t assume that a 3.5 GPA is half A’s, half B’s. You need to calculate the credits to figure it out. Anatomy/Physiology + lab is 4 credits, other classes are less credits. So every class grade is worth a different amount. The advisor should be able to help. Each semester, we pray that she can get through! The clinical courses are in great facilities.

ASU Phoenix life: Nursing, Law, and Journalism are on the downtown Phoenix campus and the facilities are nice. ASU’s main campus is in Tempe, a 20-minute ASU shuttle ride. Taylor Place is a newer, contemporary dorm and it’s nice, with security guard and decent sized rooms. Nursing students are on the same floors. The dining hall and mail room are on the bottom level, the classes are next door. There is a Starbuck’s, mini convenience store, and Chick-Fil-A on the bottom level and a Panda Express just opened. Dining hall food is okay but not great. Move-in day is awesome, very organized—they had movers to move her in, water and snacks, along with a DJ. Best move-in we have ever experienced. As for the campus life, there is none, it’s downtown! And there are homeless around (that they clear out during orientation and move-in day). All the clubs are on the Tempe campus. Frankly, this could be difficult for freshman if they want a campus life. But nursing is not an easy program beginning in the second semester with Anatomy/Physiology so they don’t have a lot of time to joke around anyway (depends on the student, of course, but when students mention they want to join a sorority, that is probably too time consuming). The students are diverse and nice, they have good social skills.

We love the ASU administration, they really seem to care about students if they have issues. Top, down, the ASU President seems to care about student success.

As far as other schools, CA nursing is too impacted, cannot even get into the community college classes to transfer to a CalState. Other DAs have super high GPA requirements for admission and few spots. UC Irvine nursing students take classes with pre-meds! ASU nursing students are not with pre-meds, they are with kinesiology, physical therapy, and others.

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@JessiesGirl thank you for sharing this info. It shows how careful you have to be when considering even direct admit programs . Some intentionally plan to or just weed out a lot of students in the first and second years. Best of luck to your daughter!

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Thank you @JessiesGirl! My daughter is trying to decide between ASU, Cal State Fullerton and Gonzaga direct entry programs. We were supposed to do college visits next week but everything has been canceled and she really has no feel for the “vibe” of each school. Is there any chance your daughter would be willing to talk to her? We would really appreciate it…thanks again for the excellent post :slight_smile:

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Have you considered Monmouth University?

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@JessiesGirl I am currently deciding between UCI for nursing and ASU, I am heavily leaning towards ASU but is there anyway I could talk to your daughter?

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Oh, I am sorry I didn’t get back to those of you who posted! I don’t have the postings sent to my email. Kind of late, but I think ASU is easier than UCI due to the student competition. UCI has classes with pre-meds. Also, I think UC schools have nursing students with 34 ACT scores (at least UCSD does). So between the two, ASU is going to be easier, and I don’t think the name of the school makes much difference, they are both good schools. My daughter found that the classes at ASU were easy besides Anatomy and Anatomy 2 but that’s her.

Reviewing my summary: “60% of the students flunk out of the Direct Admit status.” Please check on this, it seems high but I was told that by an admin at ASU.

The admin has made some changes this year to dial down the stress a bit. This year, they changed the classes to be longer/less days, which makes it easier because it was apparently insanely busy for students in the past. Health & Illness Concepts and Pharmacology used to be two separate classes. Now it’s just called Health & Illness Concepts (but they teach some Pharm).

My daughter is in clinicals now in Junior year. In clinicals, they are put with a group of nursing students for the next two years at the same hospital and same classes so if you don’t like your group, you are SOL. There is no flunking out of clinicals, you simply retake a class if your grade is lower than 77%, but it does delay your graduation. Most people who have made it this far do pass but it’s nice that they give a second chance. Classes begin early in the morning (7am) to coincide with clinical days which start at 6am or 7am depending on the location. Your student will need a car to drive to the hospital unless there is someone they can ride with (most have cars). Some students have to drive 45 minutes to their hospital (Mayo Clinic, 6am start). Last year, they had students switch hospitals every semester but they changed it this year and they stay at the same hospital for two years. The teaching at the hospitals is meh. They should teach to the test but they don’t. The tests are challenging because they are stated like NCLEX questions, but this prepares them for the NCLEX and there is a high NCLEX pass rate at ASU.

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I found this post most useful when helping my DS create a college list for his nursing BSN. Thought I would share some of his school choices, as well as progress toward admissions. DS’s applications probably looked different than the typical high school senior’s. He is 3.5 years into an enlistment in the US Marine Corps as an infantryman, albeit one who has sought out a lot of combat trauma care opportunities and discovered an interest in a nursing career.

He created a list (including Quinnipiac, Belmont, Carroll College (MT), Westminster, Duquesne, Seattle Pacific) but eventually decided he wanted to be in the Pacific Northwest. The resulting college list was short with the following results:

Seattle Pacific University, WA - nursing conditional admission, which means apply during sophomore year with a 2.85 gpa and no less than a C in all prereqs. Communication with SPU indicates between 85-100% of those who meet this minimum get a nursing seat, and that it is typically 100%. It is possible to wait a semester and reapply, if by some chance below the cut line. He’s confident he will be in the top half of his nursing cadre (I am too). Pretty campus north of Seattle.

Carroll College, MT - direct nursing seat, needs to maintain a C- or higher in all nursing prereqs and nursing course as well as overall 2.75 gpa. Nursing courses start in sophomore year which is earlier than most others. Has a more rigorous first year curriculum than the others. Pretty cold winters, somewhat remote, smaller town.

Westminster College, UT - direct nursing seat, needs to maintain a C or higher in all prereqs and nursing courses as well as 2.3 gpa. Special requirement of the practical - must complete a course such as EMT, CNA prior to starting nursing coursework. Pretty campus smack downtown.

Expenses were not an issue as he’ll be using the GI Bill, however below I’ve included below the merit scholarships offered against tuition for his academic record (a 3.5UW GPA with 5 APs, lots of ECs with leadership experience, and some unusual experiences as a US Marine).

SPU - 50% off tuition ($18.25K off $36.5K) = $18.25K
Carroll College - (21K off $39.1K) = $18.1K
Westminster - (22K off $41.4K) = $19.4K

DS is currently leaning toward SPU, even though he has direct nursing seats at the other two schools as it just feels like the right place for him (close to home, girlfriend after a few years deployed to Middle East and Far East). He visited Westminster (and could see himself there), but not Carroll (and no time to visit before May 1st as he is currently deployed overseas). He really liked the SPU campus, and friendly vibe, and I must agree it’s pretty beautiful and within an hour of home.

So, just wanted to sum up by saying you can be a B+/A- student in high school, and find yourself offered direct nursing admission at fine schools!

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