NCLEX Pass Rates vs. Graduation Rates

[NavyVetNurse]

Now that I am finished with the trials and tribulations of nursing school, I cannot help but wonder why the graduation success rate of a nursing school is not published alongside their NCLEX passing rate. For example, the school I attended (Kellogg Community College) graduates approximately 50% of a starting class. Yet it has a NCLEX passing rate of 93%. That is a significant difference. From my experiences, there were a large number of students who are going to make excellent nurses but were lost for reasons well beyond their abilities, knowledge, and skills. But, that's a story for another day. Hindsight being twenty-twenty, I would have looked at things differently if such data was available. Nursing school is a time consuming and costly endeavor and such information should be readily available to perspective students. In addition, such data would promote healthy competition and ensure schools are modifying their programs to be both efficient and effective in preparing students for a career in nursing rather than placing an emphasis on passing an exam. As nurses, we should address this issue for the future and integrity of the profession.

[elkpark]

Many of us here advise people who are "shopping" for nursing programs to identify and consider the graduation rate of schools in conjection with the NCLEX pass rates. NCLEX pass rates by themselves can be deceptive.

[CT Pixie, BSN, RN]

My State BON has yearly lists of both the NCLEX pass rates as well as the graduation rates of each nursing school (LPN, RN (ASN, BSN and accelerated BSN programs).

The graduation information list not only gives info on how many graduated but it also gives info on how many started, how many graduated, how many came into the program from somewhere other than the start (transfer students), how many LPNs in the RN program, etc

[NavyVetNurse]

Thank you for the information. What State(s) are you referencing?

[Pangea Reunited, ASN, RN]

I'm not sure it would make a difference to me. People fail to graduate for so many reasons that have nothing to do with the quality of the program. The one good outcome I can imagine (with published graduation rates), is that wait-list schools could become less common and competitive entry schools could become more common. It's unpleasant to have top grades/scores and be stuck in a two year line behind people who are barely scraping by and have little chance of success.

[llg, PhD, RN]

I believe that both graduation and NCLEX pass rates should be readily available to prospective students. In fact, I would go further and recommend that schools publish when students fail out in the program ... e.g. X% after the 1st semester, Y% after the 2nd semester, etc. so that people can know what to expect.

Also, their accreditation status should be readily available -- even though many students don't know what that means.

I also think that schools should make some effort to have 1st job information on recent graduates so that people can see what types of jobs will be available to graduates of the program. I live in a town with a few really crappy nursing schools. The better hospitals rarely hire new grads from those schools -- and yet I meet students from those schools believing that they'll step right into the best jobs at those best hospitals after graduation. It's sad.

[brillohead, ADN, RN]

I think there are MANY reasons that need to be taken into consideration, and I don't think it's always possible for a school to disclose them because in many cases the school has no idea why someone failed/dropped out.

I also graduated from KCC (same school as OP), and my cohort numbers are even grimmer.... Out of 80 people who started my program, only 26 graduated on schedule.

I was in the part-time program, which was seven semesters long, no summer break. Some people flunked out at the end of the first, second, third, fourth, fifth, or sixth semester. I don't recall anyone flunking out of the seventh semester, but it could have happened.

Some people dropped out due to pregnancy, illness in the family, finances, or simply not being able to manage working plus going to school plus having a family (the majority of my classmates worked and raised a family while going through the program).

Some people who failed out after completing the first half of the program were able to get their LPN certificate and take the NCLEX-PN. Some of them then went back and got the RN later, others have just stayed with the LPN.

Some people who dropped out or failed a class were able to re-enter the program and complete it successfully down the road, while others who had failed one class tried again and still failed out later in the program (KCC allows you to fail and retake one course during the program, but if you fail another course you're out permanently).

Another issue is that KCC has (or at least used to have, I don't know how much the criteria have changed in the past five years) a very lenient acceptance policy when it comes to GPA. It's not necessarily that the program is "too hard" for people to complete, but rather that, in their effort to be inclusive, they ended up allowing people into the program who really weren't academically well-suited to the rigors of nursing school. When I left they had just started adding a competitive-GPA component to the entrance requirements, but they were still also allowing in a certain number of lower-GPA students.

So.... like I said, there are a LOT of different factors that affect a school's graduation rate that may not be at all related to the quality of the program itself, and they're not easy to quantify when releasing "graduation/NCLEX success" percentages.

[NotAllWhoWandeRN, ASN, RN]

I'm not sure it would make a difference to me. People fail to graduate for so many reasons that have nothing to do with the quality of the program.

Every program should have similar fail rates for the aspects that are beyond the program's control. If a school consistently has a high percentage of students that can't make it through the program, I believe that is a strong indicator of either poor admissions practice or a poorly run program. Programs should admit the students who are most capable and help them succeed.

[kmn48]

Completely agree, I graduated with a class of 18 people (started with 67) and our NCLEX pass rates were 95-100%. Looks good on paper, but hardly any of us made it out alive! Great program, but it was cut throat. I attended University of Pittsburgh (Bradford Campus). Anyway couldn't agree more.

[Wrench Party]

My traditional BSN program started out with ~100 entering the bridge portion. I think around 40 graduated first time out, and maybe another 10 came back and finished the next year. I think our NCLEX pass rates were ~93% first time out.

Seems pretty standard from my casual experience in this topic.

[CT Pixie, BSN, RN]

Thank you for the information. What State(s) are you referencing?

Connecticut. I just looked over the latest list and I see they no longer list transfer students.

[NavyVetNurse]

Brillohead: Thanks for the response!

When I started at KCC, I went the competitive route because there was a waiting time the year before. When I started in the Fall of 2014, I discovered that there was no longer a wait time. In fact, for the past two years KCC hasn't had a wait time to get into their nursing program. Which is rather odd considering that all of the other schools in the area have waiting times.

In regards to grades and such in terms of accepting students, there appears to have been a change since you graduated. It is still true that some students who had trouble with the prerequisites (i.e., failing physiology and chemistry) had trouble. However, there were a significant number of students who had GPAs well above 3.5 and failed. The area that was consistently mentioned was KCCs strict use of instructor edited/modified NCLEX style questions and I agree. There were quite a few questions on each exam that had more than one answer, were in conflict with the latest edition of the textbook, or were in conflict with the instructor's knowledge/experience level.

Lastly, a year or so before I started, the nursing department stopped allowing students to record lectures (audio and/or visual) because an instructor mislead a student and the student had to seek action to rectify the situation. Instead of addressing the instructor's error in judgement, the Program Director and above took it out on the students. To this day that policy is still in place. Many students would love to have the ability to go back over a lecture before an exam, but they cannot.