Denver School of Nursing BSN reviews, please?

agriggs · Jul 9, 2015

I am currently a student at DSN for the BSN program and am loving every minute of it. Great teachers! Don't read the bad reviews, those are people who are bitter because they failed a class.

agriggs · Jul 9, 2015

And they failed because they didn't put enough effort in. It is all about what you put into it. The teachers care about your success. I would recommend to anyone. :)

klone, MSN, RN · Jul 9, 2015

Why DSN? Just wondering why a program that costs >$100k when there are awesome programs, such as CU, that are much less?

MsCupcakes · Jul 9, 2015

I did notice when looking at the NCLEX pass rates for Colorado that DSN had one of the lowest pass rates in the state for BSN. Not to say it's a bad program; simply that some of the less expensive programs in the state have considerably higher pass rates.

purplepixie · Jul 9, 2015

"I am currently a student at DSN for the BSN program and am loving every minute of it. Great teachers! Don't read the bad reviews, those are people who are bitter because they failed a class."

So happy to hear this! Thank you.

purplepixie · Jul 9, 2015

"I did notice when looking at the NCLEX pass rates for Colorado that DSN had one of the lowest pass rates in the state for BSN. Not to say it's a bad program; simply that some of the less expensive programs in the state have considerably higher pass rates.

I read somewhere that they accept students with lower GPAs (2.0 as opposed to 3.0 for most places), so it may also be a reflection on the students, too. Some people are either a) less unprepared or b) not the best at standardized testing, which unfortunately is how most knowledge is credited."

agriggs · Jul 9, 2015

It's 50,000$ for the BSN program and the pass rates are lower because there are more people. Places like cu have 50 or so people so the ratio is different. DSN has three or four times that. So the ratios and stats are different.

agriggs · Jul 9, 2015

And yes they accept people with lower gpa's as Well because they believe you don't have to be a straight A student to be a good nurse. So yeah they have lower expectations for acceptance but trust me they push you and you learn ALOT. there are always going to be a handful of people who try to slide by and end up not graduating on time, such as having to retake a class. Or not passing the nclex the first time. In all the classes, anything lower than a 78% is failing.

purplepixie · Jul 9, 2015

Why DSN? Just wondering why a program that costs >$100k when there are awesome programs, such as CU, that are much less?

It costs about $54K with everything included except living expenses and food, I believe. That seems to be pretty standard for most of the schools I've been looking at.

DSN because:

- If I'm going to be busting my butt for a second degree, I'd like to be an environment that I'm likely to be happy in (near mountains!)

- Their admission/matriculation timeline works with my desired timeline.

- I only need to take 4 additional courses - two of which are almost complete - to get into the program. My goal is to join a 2016 cohort. For a lot of ABSN programs, I'd need to take another few years of school just to apply which I don't want to do. Already have had 4+ years of undergrad.

I would apply to other schools in Colorado, but DSN is the only one I'll meet criteria for class prerequisite-wise.

klone, MSN, RN · Jul 9, 2015

It's 50,000$ for the BSN program and the pass rates are lower because there are more people. Places like cu have 50 or so people so the ratio is different. DSN has three or four times that. So the ratios and stats are different.

It's actually $90,000+ for the BSN program. But it appears that the OP is talking about an aBSN program. Which, I checked... CU is about half the price of DSoN's aBSN tuition.

And what you said above makes no sense. The pass rate is calculated as a percentage. Saying more students = lower pass rate makes no sense whatsoever.

They take students with lower GPAs because they're a FOR PROFIT university, and that's what for profit schools do - take the students who cannot get accepted into other programs. Because they have to answer to their shareholders.

klone, MSN, RN · Jul 9, 2015

This is a cut and paste of what I wrote in the Colorado forum when the topic came up:

I think the best place to look is the Colorado BoN's website, where they have list of all the pass rates for the last several years. For 2012, 2013, 2014:

DSoN: 94%, 87%, 80%

Regis: 95%, 78%, 91% (worth mentioning is their ABSN is 98, 95,94)

CU: 95%, 92%, 93%

For the last 10 years, CU's pass rate has always been above 90%, the lowest being 92%.

Based on that, I would say that CU is the best bet over DSoN and Regis, both for cost as well as pass rates.

On the other hand, DSoN's pass rate is all over the board, ranging from 61% to 94%, but the average appears to be in the 80s.