Community college or University for RN before CRNA?

Nursing Students SRNA

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I am a recent graduate with a BS in Exercise Science planning to pursue my BSN and CRNA. I am looking to save as much money as I can and am curious if going to a community college for my RN and doing an RN-BSN program vs going to a university would be acceptable. Any inquiries would be appreciated!

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Seeing as you already have your BS in Exercise Science, it seems to me that it would be the best use of your time (and possibly money) to complete a post-baccalaureate entry level nursing program, if one is available where you live. Some (maybe most, these days?) of these programs offer an entry-level master's degree, or a BSN, either of which would qualify you for admission to graduate CRNA programs (aside from the typical upper level chemistry requirements and/or GRE, if you haven't done those already) .

Check out the admission requirements for the CRNA programs you are interested in, contact them if you need to. Some don't necessarily require you to have a BSN, in some cases it is adequate to have a bachelor's degree in a "related science field", as long as you also happen to be a Registered Nurse. In which case your cheapest option might be to just go the community college ADN route... again, this is all dependent on whether or not your chosen CRNA programs are fine with you having a non-nursing bachelor's degree in addition to your RN, don't take my word for any of this.

It seems to me the ADN then BSN thing would be the longest road for you at this point, looking at at least 2 years for the ADN program, more if you still have to complete pre-reqs, and then something like a minimum of 9 months in the RN to BSN program, which you might not be quite interested in doing immediately after you finish your ADN program.

So if the "non-nursing bachelor's degree" + RN license isn't an option for your CRNA schools of choice, cost aside and in terms of sheer time and effort I would probably recommend either a post-bacc program or a BSN program. You'll just have to plug in the numbers and see what works best for you.

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I agree with PrimeRib. Look up "post-baccalaureate accelerated BSN" programs in your area. These are for students with non-nursing bachelor degrees and you can typically complete them in about 15 months. I would not recommend going the ASN and then RN-BSN route. Time is money and an accelerated BSN option gives you credit for your pre-reqs and humanities while saving you time by holding classes through the summer.

Best of luck to you!

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