I've been an LPN for 2 years now and also work agency with General Healthcare Resources. I want to get my RN but my husband is in school also for his RN so I have little choice but to do it online if I'm going to do it at all. I went to EC's website and created my EC account. Now what do I do ? How do I know what and how many classes/courses I must take to get my degree? Do I have to pay the $75 fee to apply just to find out if I have to take too many courses? I took a lot of prerequisites at local community college for the RN already.
Also, I cannot find out on my state board of nursing (PA) if they even accept EC degrees- do you know if they do?? I don't want to get into anything I cannot get out of (ie: TCN). Thanks
Thank you SO much for the awesome reply! I'm going to post again, but I'm running around at this very moment. I will be back! :) Your reply/post was really encouraging. I wish I had known about this college ages ago.
Oh yeah!...PS. You receive actual letter grades @ Excelsior? :) If so, that's fantastic. I'd take it either way, but I would love to aim for A grades in that case!
Yes, for all of your nursing exams, and for any gen ed courses or exams you take you get letter grades. When you take the exams at pearson, you walk out and they hand you a printout with your letter grade on it. You don't have to wait to see if you passed like for the nclex. And each nursing class is 3 credits so you can raise your gpa a lot if you get a bunch of A's. Your cpne, fcca, and information literacy class is pass/fail, so no letter grade for those, you just earn credits for those if you pass them. I agree with what the above poster said about the Health safety class. It's a very basic class, so you probably won't have to review too much for it, you should check out the excelsior website and find the content guide for health safety and see how familiar the material is for you, then take the exam while you're waiting for excelsior to approve your transcripts and such.
You do not need to go thru Rue or College Network or ANY of that! In fact, I encourage you to STAY AWAY. Everything you need can be found on eBay - New more at low prices.
Type in Excelsior and whatever the title is that you are looking for. There are people selling the study tests, notes, and guides on CDs, etc. Stay FAR away from ANYTHING that requires you sign a contract. Excelsior does not endorse them or support them.
Really Erika? I heard that you don't need anything extra, at all, outside of the actual practice tests and guides. However, I am willing to purchase something if it makes a difference between grades :-) Are all of the nursing exams, that Excelsior gives, NCLEX format Qs?..or is more knowledge-based?
It wasn't wrong, but you can take pre-reqs and a couple of the nursing exams before you have to pay the enrollment fee. Once you've paid that, you've started the clock ticking toward your student services annual fee (SSAF) being due, which is $440. But no worries -- I did the same thing!
Pick your first exam -- might as well start with Essentials of Nursing Care: Health Safety, which was formerly known as NC1. Download the exam content guide (when you've logged in to your "MyEC" page on the website, you'll see a link for "Free Examination Content Guides" somewhere down the right side of the page), and use that content guide to direct your learning. Some people use textbooks, others use notes from eBay sources like StudyGroup101, or used TCN modules on eBay. I used a combination of all of those things. There is a lot of information on Excelsior in this forum -- the search function can help. :) Good luck!!
Ok lunah, I want to inquire on how you are doing with the Excelsior College as I am thinking about to start. Please inform me on status. Thanks my email is [email protected]
Really Erika? I heard that you don't need anything extra, at all, outside of the actual practice tests and guides. However, I am willing to purchase something if it makes a difference between grades :-) Are all of the nursing exams, that Excelsior gives, NCLEX format Qs?..or is more knowledge-based?
Hey just wanted to check with you on how Excelsior is working out for you, I am about to start and trying to find somebody with some knowledge about this program. Please Help..... Thanks so much!!!!
I just heard that Ohio is not going to except excelsior or online degrees after this year. I was still kind of thinking of doing the online degree, but not if this is going to be the case.
so I have little choice but to do it online if I'm going to do it at all. I went to EC's website and created my EC account. Now what do I do 
? How do I know what and how many classes/courses I must take to get my degree? Do I have to pay the $75 fee to apply just to find out if I have to take too many courses? I took a lot of prerequisites at local community college for the RN already. 
RN543
134 Posts
Yes, for all of your nursing exams, and for any gen ed courses or exams you take you get letter grades. When you take the exams at pearson, you walk out and they hand you a printout with your letter grade on it. You don't have to wait to see if you passed like for the nclex. And each nursing class is 3 credits so you can raise your gpa a lot if you get a bunch of A's. Your cpne, fcca, and information literacy class is pass/fail, so no letter grade for those, you just earn credits for those if you pass them. I agree with what the above poster said about the Health safety class. It's a very basic class, so you probably won't have to review too much for it, you should check out the excelsior website and find the content guide for health safety and see how familiar the material is for you, then take the exam while you're waiting for excelsior to approve your transcripts and such.