Do nursing schools look at your entire unofficial transcripts?

[jaidon84]

Hey everyone. Right now I am only 1 bio-science class away from transferring to a nursing program and I am looking to strictly apply to state schools or community colleges. All my nursing prerequisite courses are at A and B-level grades, and I have NO withdraws for those courses. However i was previously an engineering major before I switched into nursing and unfortunately i have very bad record record on my engineering courses, i dropped about 4-5 courses in the 1 year and a half i was taking my Eng-prerequisites (namely physics and upper-math classes). Note this was only a couple years ago. Now i am realizing that perhaps this will gravely affect my chances of being accepted into a program, and that perhaps they wont see me as a dedicated student because of my past. Has anyone had a similar experience of mines? Did you still get into a program? Please do not recommend private schools since I am not taking out any loans. Thanks for any responses!

[Thoenix]

I think it depends on the school. The school I've applied (a community college) to only looks at your grades in your pre- and co-requisites, nothing else. Other schools might look at more.

[llg, PhD, RN]

The poster above is correct. It depends on the school. Each school determines its own admissions criteria. Some consider the overall GPA and others focus only on specific courses. I suggest you ask the schools that you are considering and try to apply to at least one school that only focuses on the required pre-reqs.

[jfast]

As per usual, the answer of "it depends on the school" is correct here. Reach out to schools you are interested in. If you speak to an advisor or someone over enrollment at a nursing program, ask them candidly about your concerns. As others have mentioned, some only look at prereqs which would be to your advantage. Others will look at not only overall GPA but also may have concerns that "upper" classes were where struggles occurred. I certainly agree with llg to just be smart about where you apply.

[J_N]

I went to college initially, dropped out year 3 with a 2.6 GPA, plenty of dropped classes and F's. I went back to school after a few years, earned A grades in everything I took, most of which were prereqs and finishing my undergrad psych degree, and was accepted into nursing programs (absn) that listed higher cumulative gpa requirements than I had.

[rnhopeful82, ASN, RN]

Yup, definitely depends on the school. Mine took my transfers to complete requirements for the ASN but only looked at grades for classes I took at their school for the GPA portion of my application.

[sunshineee]

depends on the school. for an accelerated program, a lot will look at the last 60 credits and your prerequisites scores and nothing else.