FNP preceptors in the Houston/South Houston area

[turnforthenurse, MSN, NP]

Hello everyone,

I am DESPERATE. I need a clinical preceptor for my upcoming rotation in January. The semester starts on the 9th but my program highly recommends waiting 3-4 weeks to get some didactic content before starting clinical...so my rotation technically wouldn't start until the end of January/beginning of February. I've called countless places asking me to call back at another time, left messages, got rejected because they're at capacity for students, you name it!

This is my first clinical and I am looking for 120 hours this semester. I'm either looking for family practice, women's health/OB or pediatrics. Please and thank you!!!

[Buyer beware, BSN]

Your program should have told you from the start they didn't do anything to help you find preceptors.

As you have mentioned the market is saturated. This is common throughout the country.

You would be doing your fellow nurses a favor by naming this school as it may act as an impetus for the school to at least inform other potential NP students from the start of the program that its relationship to the preceptor community is nonexistent.

This, I believe, would be the honest thing to do in sparing some very good students a lot of disappointment with loans coming due.

Many schools like South University and University of Phoenix do not have formal contacts either through good relations or contractual ties to preceptors.

They and other schools are aware of the problem and have been for a long time. But as long as the students engage in magical thinking that it won't effect them, it's business as usual.

But the schools and their accreditors should shoulder the lion's share of the blame because there is no way to sugar-coat being lead on through deception.

[turnforthenurse, MSN, NP]

Your program should have told you from the start they didn't do anything to help you find preceptors.

As you have mentioned the market is saturated. This is common throughout the country.

You would be doing your fellow nurses a favor by naming this school as it may act as an impetus for the school to at least inform other potential NP students from the start of the program that its relationship to the preceptor community is nonexistent.

This, I believe, would be the honest thing to do in sparing some very good students a lot of disappointment with loans coming due.

Many schools like South University and University of Phoenix do not have formal contacts either through good relations or contractual ties to preceptors.

They and other schools are aware of the problem and have been for a long time. But as long as the students engage in magical thinking that it won't effect them, it's business as usual.

But the schools and their accreditors should shoulder the lion's share of the blame because there is no way to sugar-coat being lead on through deception.

Thankfully, I received a call from a coordinator and I have a preceptor in the works.

My school helps us find preceptors but only as a last resort. We have GNE but it will only last until sometime this upcoming year, which is why they will only use GNE unless absolutely necessary - they want us to attempt self-placement first. We have a certain number of sites that were on our GNE list but even after multiple emails to my school's clinical coordinator, they basically said to keep on trying.

[Buyer beware, BSN]

Thankfully, I received a call from a coordinator and I have a preceptor in the works.

My school helps us find preceptors but only as a last resort. We have GNE but it will only last until sometime this upcoming year, which is why they will only use GNE unless absolutely necessary - they want us to attempt self-placement first. We have a certain number of sites that were on our GNE list but even after multiple emails to my school's clinical coordinator, they basically said to keep on trying.

That's great to hear. You lucked out to a certain degree but with all the time and money involved preceptors should never be a matter of luck.

The only way this situation is going to improve and realistically be dealt with is for students to identify the schools that are deficient in this area, which are most, and force them to not be deceptive about this issue.

By the way, you still haven't named your school so I will assume collegiality does not come into play here.

The problem with this tact is that most students are stealthy about this problem which allows the schools to play the preceptor game at the expense of the students because it's obvious the accrediting bodies could care less.

But that's another issue.

This is just all not worthy of saying you offer a professional education as in "just keep trying."

So go ahead and name the school. It appears as though they are/were willing to let you hang out to dry.