Questions NKU nursing students ask about clinical placement

In NKU's online NP tracks, you do. Students in the MSN FNP, AGACNP and PMHNP programs and the post-master's NP certificates, including NP-to-PMHNP, find a preceptor and site, then file a self-placement request in Medatrax. NKU's Students page makes learning that process each student's responsibility, along with securing the site and completing any affiliation agreement.

NKU also helps students who request assistance finding a preceptor. Its MSN Student Placement Team answers at studentclinicalinfo@nku.edu, and NKU keeps agreements with sites whose list it does not hand out. Nursing Education and Nurse Executive Leadership students sit under the same Students page, so the same process appears to apply. Track-specific questions go to your Clinical and Concentration Coordinators. Our page on NKU's placement assistance explains what the team offers.

NKU's floor is 30 days: preceptor details must reach it at least that long before the clinical begins, and it strongly advises 90. One line in NKU's online FAQ goes further and says requests should go in no later than 90 days before the rotation, so treat 90 as your working target. The exact dates for your cohort are posted in Canvas.

Every online course runs 7 weeks, you take one clinical per session, and there are six sessions a year: Fall 1, Fall 2, Spring 1, Spring 2, Summer 1 and Summer 2. Fall 1 2026, for example, runs from August 24 to October 9. Counting back from your session's first day tells you when the search has to be finished. Our NKU placement deadlines page lines both rules up against each session.

For the MSN FNP, AGACNP and PMHNP, and for every post-master's NP certificate, the current program pages say 750 clinical hours. Nursing Education needs 200 and Nurse Executive Leadership 100. Post-master's DNP students build to 1,000 hours beyond the bachelor's, and MSN hours that can be verified count toward that. NRP 478P, the RN-to-BSN leadership practicum, is measured by its project, not by hours. Per-course hours are mostly unpublished; NKU describes each rotation as roughly 125 to 150 hours, and the 2024-25 catalog lists 150 hours each for four AGACNP clinicals.

Some older NKU pages, and NKU's online FAQ, still quote 500 to 600 hours for NP students. The current program pages say 750, and your Canvas clinical shell settles it for your cohort. The NKU clinical hours page shows every track in one table.

NKU's NP programs accept applications from eleven states only: Kentucky and its neighbors Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Virginia and West Virginia, plus Michigan, Georgia, Florida, Colorado and Nevada. Preceptors, too, have to sit in a state NKU approves, so your search is bound by NKU's state tables as well as by your address. Of those eleven, Illinois, Michigan and Nevada are outside the Nurse Licensure Compact. NKU's licensure disclosure adds that living in a restricted state can block field placements.

Those tables have loose ends. On NKU's MSN and certificate table, South Carolina appears in both columns, and Virginia is authorized on the newer of NKU's two published copies but not the older one. If your state is on either list, check with studentclinicalinfo@nku.edu before you commit to a site. See NKU NP admission states and NKU state authorization for the full picture.

NKU runs a state and federal background check through PreCheck StudentCheck at admission, and tracks clinical compliance through Sentry. The specific items, such as immunizations, TB testing and CPR, are listed only inside Canvas under General Clinical Information, and NKU notifies you once you are clinically ready.

Student liability insurance is billed as a class fee on each clinical course, through your student account. Your PreCheck and Sentry record is part of what Contracts & Compliance reviews on each self-placement request, which is why a lapsed item can hold up an otherwise complete request. Keep those items current for the whole program, not only at admission. Our NKU clinical compliance page walks through each item.

NKU students choose us to take the search and the paperwork off their plate. A placement advisor tracks down a preceptor suited to NKU's rules for your track, in an approved state near your home, gathers the preceptor's documents, and has your Medatrax request ready early.

Approval always rests with NKU; our part is a request with nothing missing and nothing out of line. Pricing depends on your track, hours, specialty, location, timing and number of rotations, and you get a written quote before committing. Should a preceptor leave mid-session, the replacement search begins right away. Read how it works for the full sequence.