FNP Graduate from Chamberlain College of Nursing Dec 2015

Nursing Students Chamberlain College

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I'm a family nurse practitioner and graduated from Chamberlain College of Nursing's FNP program as of December 2015.

Lately I have been getting a lot of questions from nurses either looking to start Chamberlains FNP program or who are in the program.

I decided that I would create a blog to address these questions. Feel free to ask me anything about Chamberlain's FNP program.

Specializes in Hospitalist Medicine.
Hello, I'm considering Chamberlains's MSN-FNP program, but i currently work full time (M-F 8:30-5). How often are you required to complete clinicals toward the end of the program? Will i need to work Part Time?

You have to do 125 clinical hours in the 8 week session. However, most try to get them done in 7 weeks because the final week is a short week. If you do it in 7 weeks, it's 18 hours per week. It can be difficult to get preceptors after 5 pm and on the weekends to fulfill your clinical requirements if you work M-F 8:30-5. I work 12 hour shifts Fri, Sat & Sun to have Mon through Fri open. If you can't change your work hours, you may have to work part-time.

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Hi ChamboRN,

I'm getting nervous about the Capstone class too. I heard the passing rate for exit exam is really low in last class, in addition CCN raised the score on the exit exam. I wonder if you made through the exit, and if so what do you do to prepare? Please help!!!

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Hi, ChamberlainFNP2015,

Could you let me know how to study for the exit exam? I heard that it's difficult and there's no way to prepare it. I'm in NR 602, but i would like to be prepared. Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance!!

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Just wanted to let you give you an update that Chamberlain FNP track have implemented a major change in their curriculum changes as of January 2018. So most of the information presented here may have gone through some changes. There are weekly quizzes with lockdown browser (Respondus) and midterm and finals with lockdown browser plus web camera. Not an open book exam. The immersion weekend set up was also change to Head to Toe assessment. In some course such as NR 602, students will present a video presentation using Kaltura app . On the final course NR 661, students are required to go back to Chicago to attend a mandatory FNP review.

It seems that the new changes needs a lot work. I am almost 2 classes from completing the program but I am somewhat disappointed.

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Specializes in Hospitalist Medicine.
Just wanted to let you give you an update that Chamberlain FNP track have implemented a major change in their curriculum changes as of January 2018. So most of the information presented here may have gone through some changes. There are weekly quizzes with lockdown browser (Respondus) and midterm and finals with lockdown browser plus web camera. Not an open book exam. The immersion weekend set up was also change to Head to Toe assessment. In some course such as NR 602, students will present a video presentation using Kaltura app . On the final course NR 661, students are required to go back to Chicago to attend a mandatory FNP review.

It seems that the new changes needs a lot work. I am almost 2 classes from completing the program but I am somewhat disappointed.

One of the reasons I left Chamberlain's program and switched to a different school was all of the negative changes which have occurred since I started the program. The instructors are left in the dark and changes are abruptly made with no prior communication, nor are the instructors aware until after the fact. The worst change was going to a data bank of random questions for midterms and finals (combined together equals 30% of your grade). They did not adequately prepare anyone for this, which resulted in a every Epidemiology class failing the midterm exam because 80% of the material was not taught to us prior to taking the exam. We can't be tested on material we haven't learned. Plus they only give you less than 2 minutes per question to answer or the test times out. This was never communicated to anyone before it was implemented. And then the school dragged its feet on changing the mid-term grades which "magically" coincided with being unable to get a full refund for the class. Just shady all the way around.

I had a wonderful experience for my RN-to-BSN program, but I would NEVER recommend this school for the FNP. Period. Go some where else. I just wasted a huge amount of time and money there. Anyone saying it's a great school who graduated before these changes taking place, it's comparing apples to oranges now. It's not the same program it once was.

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Thank you for your comment. I completed my BSN at Chamberlain and it was a good experience. I am in the FNP program at Chamberlain and it has not been a good experience. The instructors are not consistent with their grading system. I just failed my last MSN core class NR505, Advanced Evidence Based Practice with a 75.9, 76 is passing. The NR505 course content can be very challenging, you are expected to be good at statistics. The professor gave me a hard time the entire 8 weeks. First I kept getting alot of points taken off for APA format. The last 2 weeks, she took alot of points off of my last paper and discussions for the content. This is very stressful and discouraging. I appealed and within a few hours I got an email stating that I have to repeat the course. By the way, I am a nurse with almost 20 years of experience in critical care and emergency department, not that it matters.

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Hello everyone!

I hope you don’t mind me resurrecting this thread. I am in nursing school and am torn between Simmons FNP program and Chamberlains. Simmons is appealing to me as they offer a lot of help with clinical placements. From your experiences, does Chamberlain assist at all with clinical placement? Or were you all on your own?

Thank you everyone!

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4 hours ago, christie23 said:

Hello everyone!

I hope you don’t mind me resurrecting this thread. I am in nursing school and am torn between Simmons FNP program and Chamberlains. Simmons is appealing to me as they offer a lot of help with clinical placements. From your experiences, does Chamberlain assist at all with clinical placement? Or were you all on your own?

Thank you everyone!

Hi christie23, I stopped going to Chamberlain last year and switched to a local state school that I attend on campus that I like much better. Unless things changed from one year ago, you have to find your own clinical placements. I didn’t reach that point into the program, I had taken 5 courses there before leaving. However from what I have heard some people had trouble finding placements because of the new contract the preceptors had to sign and the work the preceptors had to do. I believe it’s mostly the student finding the preceptors because I was already trying to find some before I left and was worried about it. Someone else may better answer this question though since they may have gotten farther in the program than I did.

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Thank you stper24 for taking the time to get back to me, I appreciate the correspondence so much! As I dig further and further into multiple online FNP threads, the nightmare remains the same with the "on your own" clinical placement sites. I am leaning toward the university I can attend in person when we move back home to avoid the risk of wasting time and money in the event I cannot find my own preceptors.

Glad you are enjoying your new school and are on the track to success! Your time is appreciated.

Best wishes!

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5 minutes ago, christie23 said:

Thank you stper24 for taking the time to get back to me, I appreciate the correspondence so much! As I dig further and further into multiple online FNP threads, the nightmare remains the same with the "on your own" clinical placement sites. I am leaning toward the university I can attend in person when we move back home to avoid the risk of wasting time and money in the event I cannot find my own preceptors.

Glad you are enjoying your new school and are on the track to success! Your time is appreciated.

Best wishes!

You are very welcome! Good luck finding the right school for you! I hope all goes well! ?

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Hi, I’m looking into Chamberlain’s FNP program. I’m not sure if any of you answered this question but I didn’t see it. Anyway, I’m wondering aside from all the case studies is there a lot of papers and exams on top of that for each class? thanks in advance! 

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Specializes in Medical surgical/progressive care.

I'm also planning to start in Chamberlain this January. Any inputs? For those with full time jobs and family, how did you manage to juggle all responsibilities and still have time for classes? Lastly, I'd like to know more about finding preceptors for practicum, what are the requirements for the preceptor and how hard is it to find them? Thanks in advance!

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