Dropped out of nursing program - how to salvage?

Hello! I just found out about this forum and it's amazing. I am in a confusing situation and I was wondering if you all could help me out.

I'm dropping out of a BSN program (ironically) due to health problems, with 19 credits to go.

I am trying to figure out the requirements for the basic BS in liberal arts from Excelsior College and how it compares to my credits.

I have a basic AA in general studies from a community college, and transferred 64 credits from there to my university. There I earned 23 more lower level credits and qualified for the upper division professional nursing courses. In the professional program I have at least 39 upper division credits so far.

It seems like I'd be good to go if I take that information literacy course I've heard about, but I'm having doubts. The courses I took were in a professional program; at least 9 of my upper division credits are from practicum courses where you run around in a hospital and annoy the staff.

I noticed that the EC application states that nursing courses are evaluated only upon enrollment so I'm worried. EC offers a lot of nursing courses but since I'm not an RN I can't pursue those degrees.

I'm wondering if EC will be rigid in their classification of nursing courses and not count my upper division courses towards their bare-bones liberal arts degree. If they do apply them to that degree I it looks like I'm all set. What do you think?

Thank you so much for your time and consideration of this situation.

 

They might give you some guidance on the phone. The BLS degree has pretty loose requirements, and it allows almost any type of legit credit once its general education requirements are met. My guess is that if they will award credit for one type of program they will award it for the other. If you've taken a lot of biology type courses you might do well on the GRE subject exam in biology or maybe chemistry, which are worth up to 30 semester hours each.

 

The main problem I see with your credits as you have described them is not that I think Excelsior won't accept most of them, but that many of them are going to be considered Applied Professional/Free Elective for a Liberal Arts degree program. You need more upper-level credits in Liberal Arts & Sciences.

You might have more luck getting them accepted if you enroll as a B.S. student, not a B.A., since that degree requires less overall credits in the Arts & Sciences. You may only use 60 of your nursing credits toward a B.S. as free electives, but they may allow you to use them for your second depth requirement for a B.A. (but not for B.S.) if you have your other depth in an Arts & Sciences subject (History, Social Sciences, Natural Sciences, or Humanities).

I think your only trouble will be getting enough upper level credits in the Arts & Sciences, but if you do well on a GRE subject exam, as already suggested, that will probably take care of that. They will only take 9 upper-level credits in an Applied Professional area such as nursing for the B.S. as counting your upper-level requirements. They will probably accept the rest of your upper-level credits in nursing as free electives, but they will not count toward the 21 credits you will need at the upper-level in Arts & Sciences. Other upper-level DSST exams such as Money & Banking and the history exams will help.

Here is a blank degree plan that may help you figure out where your credits will go: http://www.degreeforum.net/excelsior-thomas-edison-charter-oak-specific/9757-blank-degree-plans-all-big-three.html

And as a guide to filling out the blank plan, here's a general guide of which kinds of credits are Arts & Sciences (Liberal Arts) and which are Free Elective/Applied Professional: http://www.charteroak.edu/Current/Academics/DegreeBasics/liberalartsrequirements.cfm

 

Just curious. Did you have 1/2 your clinicals done? If so, you should challenge the ASN at Excelsior, then you are eligible for the NCLEX-RN. Unless nursing just isn't your thing anymore especially with health concerns.

In any case, best of luck in your pursuit of a Bachelors degree, I think you will be pleased with the Excelsior route!

 

Have you investigated whether the BA/BS in Individualized Studies at Charter Oak State College might be more conducive to your particular situation? You require 18 credit hours at the upper level (300 and 400 series courses).

 

Thanks for your replies - I'm still looking up some of the suggestions and I'm going to make some phone calls tomorrow. I might be able to make a dent in the biology subject exam. Unfortunately we have a big chunk of our clinical hours in the last semester of our program, so I don't think that I could challenge anything to be elegible for the NCLEX.

Here is my degree plan, in case it helps:

http://www.utexas.edu/nursing/docs/bsn_degree_plan_06.pdf

Here are the course descriptions:

http://registrar.utexas.edu/catalogs/ug08-10/ch13/ug08.cr13.html#nursing-n



The "Specialized Topics in Nursing" course that I took ended up being lower level. However, it looks like the "Nursing Research" 2 hour class is UL.

Here are the classes that I have not taken:

N354 Spanish for Healthcare Professionals (I think that this is UL, too bad I didn't take it yet)

N365P Nsg Care of Childbearing Families Practicum
N366P Nursing Care of Children and Families Practicum (dropping this right now, unfortunately)
N375P Public Health Nursing Practicum
N377P Clinical Care Management Practicum
N278 Synthesis of Nursing Knowledge
N279 Capstone Preceptorship



On the plus side, though, I gained instructor approval to take a 3 hour graduate-level "Strategies of Teaching in Nursing" course this semester. Does EC give bonus points for that? haha

Thank you again, you are all so helpful.

 

Here are the reqs for entry into the Excelsior College Nursing program ASN
Associate Degree Programs

The degree programs in the Excelsior College School of Nursing are specifically designed to serve individuals with significant background and/or experience in clinically oriented health care disciplines. For that reason, admission to the Associate Degree Nursing Program is open only to individuals in the following categories noted below.

* Licensed Practical/Vocational Nurses
* Paramedics
* Certain classifications of Military Corpsmen
* Respiratory Therapist, Respiratory Technician, Respiratory Care Practitioner
* Physician trained and/or licensed outside of United States
* Physician or Physician's Assistant trained and/or licensed in the United States
* Licensed Psychiatric Technician for Arkansas or Colorado only
* Licensed, Certified or Registered Midwife
* Students who have successfully completed at least 50% of the clinical nursing credit hours with a minimum grade of C in an associate, baccalaureate, or RN diploma nursing program within 5 years of completing their last nursing course


Make sure you discuss with the admission counselor that you were in your last year of the BSN program. The ASN program is a great way to finish your RN but it is not for everyone! About a 50% failure rate on the clinical exam. I only had an EMT certification and made it through the program. Obviously, since I graduated, they have increased their entrance standards. Are you a Rad Tech?

 

>>
I agree with Delta. In addition, if you can pass the NCLEX, you can then go BACK to Excelsior and test out of the remaining couple BSN nursing classes and you would have both the ASN and BSN. The upper level BSN courses are only theory- no clinical and no science lab.

EVen if you can't or don't want to be a nurse, you could complete the degree and work in a related occupation.

*by the way, Alissa is right. Nursing credits will absolutely positively not count as liberal arts courses. Your general ed courses are the only courses that will. So- with that in mind, I'd really really consider Delta's suggestion so you don't leave this party with nothing.

 

On the positive side I see many of your completed arts and science courses are upper level (at least going by their course #'s) .

If you decided to not get a degree in nursing, based on the number of appied professional (AP)courses you have I would consider the Excelsior BS-Liberal studies as it lets you use 60 credits in AP's, one of which is a 1 credit info lit course. So that would leave you the ability to use 59 AP credits toward your degree. If you go the BS-Liberal studies route you need 30 upper level credit , 21 in Arts & Science and 9 can be AP.

Another thought is Excelsior's new Business degree (which starts March 1st) a Bachelor in Professional Studies. There is not much info available yet but you could ask about it.

 

You are sooooo close to wrapping up at least an Associates in nursing through Excelsior. A degree in nursing can open up so many doors. I don't know what health issues you are dealing with, but if it's at all possible, I would definitely recommend completing the nursing degree through Excelsior.

 

Radioactiveman,

If you completed the pre-reqs as listed in your posted degree plan, I would say you need about 21 credits to get a BS-Liberal studies, maybe less depending on how they classify some of your courses, such as your Nursing ethics and Nursing communication courses.
I am not sure if they will count them as AP or under Humanities.

Which stat's course did you take, the degree plan lists 3 options.
Which fine arts course did you take ?


If the course numbers listed on the degree plan indicate that 300 and 400 levels = upper level, then you would be fine as far as Excelsior's BS- Liberal Studies, because you already have the 21 UL credits in A&S and 9 UL in AP.

It also seems you have met the quantitative requirement by taking stats. You appear to have a depth in Bio completed, they do allow for a depth in AP areas, not sure if nursing is one of those areas allowed.


If you are at all interested in the BS-Liberal Studies option, it might be worth the $75 to have them do an initial eval of your credits.

 

I agree. I would suggest that you either a) ask your school if you can take a leave of absence, due to your health issues and just re-start the program when you're feeling better OR b) complete your ASN through Excelsior. If you're interested in this option, I would contact the school for details.

Best of luck,
Tom

 

Radioactiveman,

I just re-read your original posting, and if the degree plan you posted is not what you actually completed for pre- reqs then the estimate I posted would not be correct. We would need the course numbers/name of the pre-reqs completed to do an estimate of what is needed for the BS-Liberal studies option.

Peace123

 

EC is closed for Presidents' Day!

Thanks again for all this great feedback. I'm actually confident that I will have found some "health within illness" (that's a nursing phrase that is thrown around a lot in school) in about a year, but I was wondering what I could accomplish in the meantime.

If I could get ANY bachelor's degree, I would be able to enter an alternate entry (AE) master's program that my school has. Basically anyone with a bachelor's degree (and prerequisite courses met) can apply, receive training to qualify for the NCLEX, and then do some graduate studies. As a nursing undergrad I have almost all of the prerequisites already. The application deadline is in December. Here is some info:

http://www.utexas.edu/nursing/html/academics/ae_msn.html



Sadly, the statistics course was transferred from the community college, so I'm thinking that its equivalent is not the upper division one listed. I believe that my fine arts elective was "Intro to Music Theory" at the community college.

Credit hours are denoted by the first number in the course numbers at my school, and upper division courses will be between 20-79 for the last two numbers.

As for the nursing admissions at EC, I think that I fall just short of 50% "clinical nursing credit hours." Right now I have 11 practicum credit hours with 12 practicum credit hours to go. Perhaps my school structured it that way on purpose. I'm not a rad tech; nursing school is my introduction to healthcare. I'm still going to call EC tomorrow.

I'm researching Charter Oak now - it seems that they welcome random things as long as your resume and rationale (and transcripts) back it up. I'm very interested in nursing education so maybe I can log some classes in education.

 

Radioactive Man,

Now that I understand how to read your course numbers, I am afraid it appears you have not met the 21 UL credits needed for the BS-Liberal Studies at Excesior.

If I was you I would consider getting an initial eval. from Excelsior, TESC and COSC, just to see which would allow you to graduate the fastest /and or easiest.

I feel having a degree conferred by Dec. through Excelsior would be doable if you are willing to take upper level ECE's and DSST exams.

 

I would be very surprised that Excelsior is going to split hairs about not accepting you to the ASN program over 1/2 a credit but crazier things have happened. Let them make that decision and of course you can always ask for a waiver from someone higher up the food chain. Can't hurt!

 

>>

Food for thought. If you do get "any" bachelor's degree, your AE program will be at grad tuition rate. That means, you are maybe spending wayyy too much money to get NCLEX access.
I support your decision to chat with Excelsior. Let me ask a few other questions if I may.
Do you have any local diploma or ADN programs? Call them too- see if you can get an idea on how transfer between yours and their school works.
At that point, you would have an RN and be very close to your bachelor's degree. You could locate any random MSN Educator program (in fact www.tesc.edu has one) which would be a fraction of the time and money when compared to an AE or even bridge program.

Lastly, a bachelor degree in liberal arts means that the majority of your credits have come from math, science, humanities, and social science. Nursing credits don't fall into those categories. When people say that a liberal arts degree is easy to earn- they mean that you have a variety of classes to fill those requirements, you can test out of classes with exams like CLEP, and you will likely have 100% transfer from previous liberal arts courses. None of this applies to nursing- so you are looking at starting almost from scratch if you go for liberal arts. You CAN do it, but you don't have to make any decisions right now- you have time to do your homework. But, as you know, your nursing courses will generally expire if left unused, while liberal arts generally won't. I'd say it's more pressing to direct those credits into any program that gives you NCLEX access asap.

 

This is a really insightful post. The Texas Board of Nursing requires that you finish your nursing curriculum within four years. For me that means that I have until the end of 2011.

I've dropped my clinicals for 3 semesters in a row now. Being in a hospital even as a student requires the ability to process and prioritize lots of information at once, and unfortunately I've sort of lost the energy to do that. I'm sensing that I would totally bomb that Clinical Performance Test of Devastation from EC. Sadly, I'm thinking that even the aforementioned December 2010 AE deadline is unrealistic and that I should consider nursing as a career to explore later in life.

You're right that it doesn't make a ton of sense to try and qualify for the NCLEX in grad school due to the cost. Sometimes when you're in a school long enough you tend to favor its programs without considering a lot of alternatives. I'm buds with a lot of the faculty.



Since I would, basically, be starting from scratch, the Charter Oak option is attractive to me. If anybody has any feedback on the Charter Oak individualized approach and how I could use my nursing background/education interest for it, that would be very welcome.

 

I am curious if your nursing courses can count towards an "area of focus" in Health Sciences? You go for a BS in Liberal Arts with two concentrations one in Health Science and one in something else?

"Q: What constitutes credit in a health science field?
A: Courses with titles such as, clinical practicum, patient assessment, physical assessment, advanced emergency care, parmed tech, intervention treatment etc. would be acceptable. Subject areas that are not accepted toward the 20 required admission credits are chemistry, biology, physics, anatomy, physiology, etc. however these courses would apply toward the arts and sciences component. "

https://www.excelsior.edu/Excelsior_College/SCHOOL_OF_HEALTH_SCIENCES/BS_IN_HEALTH_SCIENCES_DEGREE/BS_in_Health_Sciences_FAQ

Although it appears you may need some type of allied health credential or 20 credits in a "health science field" to get the BS in Health Science but you are interested in the BS Liberal Arts.

 

Whoops looks like I can't edit my posts.

Thank you for bringing that Health Science degree to my attention! I'll definitely ask about it when I call. I was only interested in the liberal arts diploma because I was mistaken about my professional credits being science credits.