While we wait for the next round of admission decisions mid December…
Question for parents who have students applying for BSN programs:
If money were not the issue, what are your student’s top 3-5 choices.
I’ll start it off. As of today, it would be:
Thats a hard question because if money were not the issue, I think our list would be different. (would have seriously looked at schools in Boston, U of Vermont, Philly)
but just from schools she applied to:
She has been talking a lot about U of Hawaii the past week as well.
Would be VERY happy to go to PLU. (Those are her people and the cost is in our sweet spot)
I’ve been following this thread since my S22 is a HS senior applying to BSN direct admit schools. I also have a daughter who graduated from the SONHP with her BSN from USF last May so I can speak to her experience as a student there.
She did not apply to UOP or Gonzaga at the time, but USF was her first choice. She absolutely loves the city vibe, the weather, and the food scene. Undergrad students also get a pass for the SF Muni bus line incorporated into their tuition which gave her the flexibility to explore the city. On campus housing was not guaranteed during her sophomore year, but now that the new Lone Mountain Residence Hall was completed for occupancy this fall, incoming students are guaranteed on campus housing for their first four semesters. The residence hall was constructed on a hilltop overlooking the golden gate bridge. The view on that hilltop is absolutely beautiful. We are bummed that she missed it.
The university has a very strong health services support system which my daughter and members of her cohort were utilizing as their clinical coursework presented academic and emotional challenges. I was impressed and very grateful for the personal attention that my daughter received when she needed the support which enabled her to succeed. For the amount of $ that we paid in tuition over the course of her attendance, this made it worthwhile for me.
In terms of the quality of the education, she swears that the BSN program at this school prepared her well in developing the clinical skills she is now applying as a registered nurse in an acute care facility new grad residency program. She seems very confident as a new nurse and appears to be thriving at her workplace.
I will throw in the caveat that the university does not have a structured NCLEX review program. USF’s NCLEX first pass rate on the California BRN website is <90%. My daughter enrolled in some review courses to help prepare her for the exam. She got her license right on time before the start of her residency program.
Thanks so much for sharing the experience @momBSND21 . That’s really helpful to hear about USF as well as the school not helping students prepare for the NCLEX. It seems to benefit their reputation if they did help students with a 1 unit course or something. Good to know!
I think the microbiology has to have a lab component, though, and you can’t do that online.
Where is your son applying to? 
S22 wants to stay in or close to CA, so his list is comprised of mostly in state programs and a few in adjacent states. The order does not necessarily reflect his preference.
S22 stats: 3.9UW, no test scores
UCLA
UCI
CSF
SDSU
APU
USF
Arizona State (accepted)
U of New Mexico (accepted)
U of Utah
He is also interested in veterinary medicine as a potential long term goal, so he is also applying to this list of schools offering animal science programs:
UC Davis
Cal Poly Pomona
Cal Poly SLO
Once all acceptances are in, he’ll make the final decision on where he wants to go and which major he wants to pursue.
Some thoughts on the college admissions process while we wait. Hope you will chime in.
It would be really useful for parents/students to see a comprehensive chart with admissions data. Common Data Set is that “chart” but you have to look at each school for each year. One (group) of the numbers I have been trying to gather is how many students are applying for a particular nursing program. This is not listed on Common Data Set and rarely given on school websites. You see it on College Confidential only after parents call or attend virtual nursing sessions hosted by the university. We have some numbers like 7000 applicants for 35 spots for UC Irvine, 300 applicants and 100-150 acceptances for Pacific Lutheran. Most of us are applying for the same ones- particularly the most popular ones. In California, that would be the 2 UCs and 3 Cal States that have direct admission. These five have admission rates that range from 2-6% with average weighted GPAs of 4.2. I’m thankful to be able to learn about these things by reading everyone’s contributions on college confidential over the past few years. It saves a lot of time, energy and money to know what are safety, target, and reach schools when you have this information. Still, we are mostly in the dark regarding nursing schools because the admissions numbers are not easily obtained. Schools are not transparent with this kind of data. Thus, lots of time, energy, money is spent applying for and hoping our student will be admitted. I appreciate @RNmomof4 for putting out her admissions results and putting together a chart. This will help future parents/students immensely for the next couple years. This is also why I am posting our results as well. Doing it for future parents/students.
I hope that you can do the same at end of this season (May 1, 2022) for the BSN Class of 2026.
Put your GPA, test scores if used, and college admissions and denials.
Finally, I bring this up because there are MANY excellent nursing programs in the country. As much as I want my D to stay in California, our good student with a 3.7 or 3.8 GPA will not be getting into our direct admission public schools. We have come to terms with that and are looking at the other schools that are just as good but further away from home. This message board is helpful but there is still scarce information on the other nursing programs we are applying for. You have to spend tens of hours sifting through years of message boards to get this “chart” I wish to have.
Has someone created a website with updated college information?
I know college consulting people have this kind of information. A friend of mine is in this business and they have a pretty good sense of the schools that their students are applying for. I only wish these numbers were more transparent and accessible. I wish we had a chart for BSN Nursing programs for the past five years.
Wouldn’t that be lovely!
I have been reflecting a lot the past few weeks on the whole process. If It weren’t for CC, Im not sure where we would be in the process. I found CC by digging.
There is such a shortage of nurses and I understand why, with clinical spaces being in demand in addition to other factors. I wish that California would invest into educating our nurses. I have 4 children and I am lucky that the one who wants to go to nursing school is a stellar student. There are plenty of 2.5 and 3.0 students that would be excellent nurses. I was one of them many moons ago. There is more to a nurse than a 4.0.
There are def more options for people that can pay the high prices. But for those who cant, us included, it gets more tricky.
I am eager for Feb/March to nail down a list that my daughter can pick from. Will she end up in Hawaii? Washington? PA?, who knows? 
(we did rule out North Dakota ;))
Hello. May I ask where you are seeing the updated profile? It appears the website still has a document that shows through 2020.
Updated profile for which school? If you are talking about SDSU Nursing, then the academic profile is only up to 2020. The admission information is for 2021 and can be found here:
My Dd’s search is over. She had previously been admitted to WVU direct admit with a decent scholarship, applied to some other places, but fell in love with an in state option when she went there for an overnight visit as part of a special scholarship program she was nominated for. It’s direct admit and she decided to go all-in and apply Early Decision. She got in and was awarded $10K/year in scholarships and is super excited about it. (With a 27 ACT and 3.9 Weighted GPA this was more than we were expecting.) The school is less than an hour from us and there’s a possibility of her doing clinicals at a hospital really close to our home, but she’s already made it known she will be in an apartment and not living with us 
Best wishes for everyone who is still trying to figure out where their child will be this fall!
Congratulations to your DD and the proud parents!
My daughter is a senior in the nursing program and UMass Amherst. I do not recommend this program. She has not had a good experience at all! I wish she had attended a different program.
Oh wow. Sorry to hear that. Could you share any specifics?
Yes I definitely can. First of all, the program is extremely disorganized. Her friends in other schools, find out their clinical placements well in advance so they can plan accordingly. At UMass, they often don’t find out until the semester begins. The professors are not helpful. For example- my student asked to meet with a professor to go over material for an upcoming test and the professor declined to meet with her. Another time she asked a question about material for an upcoming midterm and she sent two emails. The professor never even answered. These are just two of many examples of how the professors are unresponsive and not helpful. There’s no support at all for the students if they need help. Clinical placements are very far from the school. One of my student’s placements is in a hospital that is 90 minutes away from campus and she has to be there at 6:40 am. We ended up having to book a hotel for her to go to the night before because otherwise, she had to leave campus at 5 am. Her closest clinical placement is 25 miles away. Expect A LOT of long-distance driving if you decide to go there. Her friends at other schools are just given much more support. I really don’t have much to say about this program that is good. I thought because it was such a small program, the students would be well supported, but at this school, the students are literally just a number. Let me know if you have any more specific questions.
@lisag519 The Dean of nursing at UMass would probably like to know what you just shared. Have you emailed this person? Dean of Nursing at UMass
Just wanted to say that my niece is a junior nursing major at UMass Lowell and is having a great experience. So any instaters who are interested may want to check them out.
Hi All. First time posting here, but since I got so much from this site to help prepare my daughter I wanted to give back a little.
My daughter applied to ~15 schools. She went ED at TCU and found out today that she was accepted. She absolutely loves the campus, program, and faculty. We took two visits and were more impressed each time. She is very happy.
She was also accepted at ASU and Dusquene for DA and several other indirect. Other schools applied to, but no decision given yet were BC, SDSU, UNH, UConn, UMass Am, Case Western.
Some stats to help the folks on here:
UW GPA 3.82, W 4.9
Many (10) AP courses in sciences, history, english
HOSA
NHS
Volunteering at blood Bank last summer
Summer nurse shadow for a few weeks in her doctors office
Latin club
Health Sciences academy in high school
Good SAT, but we didn’t submit it
We also spent a lot of time on her essays including having PhD English student assist with editing.
Really happy to be Horned Frogs!
Good luck to all waiting on decisions.
Congrats @jtaustin!
Heard back from Westminster in Utah today. Really don’t know much about this school but the more I read, it might be a good fit. Def now on our radar. They offered fantastic merit scholarship 28K. Also finally heard back from Creighton. For some reason her application to Creighton was not submitted correctly but they straightened it out. Don’t think Creighton will be in the cards for us but some may be interested. Creighton does not accept dual enrollment Anat/Physio/Chem/ or Micro.
GPA UW 4.0
No test scores
| Cost applicantion | Common App | Tuition | Room and Board | Merit | Cost of T/R/B | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Westminster Utah | Free | Yes | 38,680 | 11, 681 | 28,000 | 22,361 |
| Creighton | $40.00 | *Yes | 42,618 | 11,600 | 21,000 | 33,218 |
This was from a previous poster…
There isn’t much on this website about the direct admit nursing program at Westminster College in Utah so I wanted to share our impression after visiting.
Our nursing tour was given by two of the nursing professors. Their passion for the nursing profession and their role as educators was very evident. As they have a very small program at Westminster ( less than 60) all the professors know their students very well. Students are often on first name terms and are able to text them with questions . It’s so close knit that students feel able to seek help without feeling they will look stupid.
We were given a tour of the simulation labs in their nursing center.They have low and high frequency mannequins. They also pay senior students to act as patients and simulate scenarios using it as a teaching and leadership opportunity. The more complicated simulations are restricted to no more than 4 students.
Clinicals also start in junior year and a great deal of care is taken to ensure all students are treated fairly and have access to a wide range of clinical opportunities. They are not handed out based on who scored the highest grade in a test. Both the nursing students we met emphasized how much emphasis is placed on building a community amongst the nursing class and supporting each other.
Clinical opportunities are generally local and offer great opportunities. The University of Utah hospital is walking distance from Westminster.
Their final capstone clinical involves shadowing a nurse and working the same 12 hour shift he / she works. They mentioned other programs doing clinicals at same locations work shorter shifts and fewer clinical hours.
NCLEX prep seems thorough. Two practice tests the last seminar and support if you do badly in either of these tests.
At Westminster although they offer direct admit, the nursing program really formally starts in the last two years. Before then the focus is on getting the pre requisite classes done. However there will be nursing students in many of these classes. There is also a Westminster Nursing Club so that nursing students can get together.
To join the nursing program at Westminster you must be a certified CNA or EMT etc by 1 August ( before you start sophomore year). I have not seen this requirement at other schools. I believe it’s because they truly want their students to have a lot of hands on experience and want them to build up as much hands on experience as possible. In Utah it’s a much more simple process to get your CNA than a state such as California. Both students we met worked shifts at hospitals on weekends or during breaks.
Hope this is helpful to anyone considering applying for this program.
The school itself is small ( 2000 students) but it has great facilities ( inc food), pretty and safe location in Sugar House and a lot of social activities and support available to students. We are very glad we took the time to visit.