should i retake classes

Nursing Students Pre-Nursing

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I want to be competitive for nursing school and my husband is planning to move to California which I have heard is very impacted. So staying put (in Arizona) might not be an option. I currently have a 3.0 and have not taken anatomy, physiology, microbiology or chemistry yet. I don't know how I will do yet (I took a high school level pre req biology class and had no trouble with it). Should I retake some of my prerequisite classes and try to get A's to be more competitive or just focus on my science classes?

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The university I attend (BSN program in Texas) has a cap on the amount of times you can retake courses or "grade replace" courses. We are only allowed to retake 3 courses for grade replacement for the entire degree. Once in the nursing program, we are only allowed to retake one nursing course and this counts as one of your three for the entire degree. Obviously every school is different but I would look into the school you are wanting to attend's policy before deciding to retake courses which you passed. Some schools do allow unlimited "retakes" but I don't feel that this is the norm. Best of luck!

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You're GPA is not that bad. You have about 14 hours of those science pre-requisites to complete, so I would finish those first, since you need them, and do really well on them to make your GPA even better. By that time you will have established where you are, California or Arizona, and you can figure out the schools you are interested in and find out what is acceptable and what is not. You may not even have to re-take any.

Good luck!

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I appreciate the replies.

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Specializes in ER trauma, ICU - trauma, neuro surgical.

One of the best ways to raise your GPA is to take classes that are required for graduation. You can knock some of them out and than nursing school will be a lighter load when you actually start. Save the re-takes for classes that you do poorly in.

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Specializes in Hospitalist Medicine.

It depends on which classes the program focuses on for your GPA requirements. Our school only looks at the required science pre-reqs. They don't use other courses to calculate your GPA. Other programs want your cummulative GPA. It varies from program to program. So, I would save your "re-takes" for when you have zero-ed in on the program you want to attend. That way, you'll know if you need any at all.

As previous posters have said, some programs put a cap on the number of re-takes, so only do so if you absolutely must.

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