Master's Degree for a School Nurse

bergren · Mar 15, 2008

My masters is in child health, but I did all of my clinical time in schools and the community. It is very valuable background, but I teach in a PH nursing program now, and I think the tools that are taught in the community curriculum are even more important for a school nurse who works alone and has to evaluate problems and make changes in a system as well as with individuals. The policy perspective and influence content is also valuable. Granted, I already had a strong Peds background having worked in 4 tertiary Children's hospitals and other acute Peds environments.

The public health program teaches community needs assessment, community evidence based interventions and community program evaluation. Epidemiology provides the population perspective to your data collection and analysis.

Some nurses choose to get the MPH rather than the MS in public health nursing- and I think the combined degree MS/MPH is the best of all worlds if you have that option.

There are also programs for the Child with Special Needs if your position is primarily special ed, but the PH and Peds degrees I think are stronger, broader degrees should you need to change jobs. I also feel that is a reason why not to get a masters in education. I think masters in education are also valuable when working in the school setting, but you are never going to be a education expert - your domain is nursing and that is the expertise they are buying when they hire you. And if anything should happen and you needed to change jobs, again the nursing degrees offer more opportunities. In some states you must have a masters in nursing as opposed to another field if you ever decide you want to teach nursing.

You have not asked about the DNP - the masters degree in nursing is planned to be phased out by 2015. Reason - most masters programs in other fields require 30 - 33 credits - masters in nursing can require up to 68 credits especially if they are advanced practice. It was felt this was cheating nurses out of a higher degree when so many credits were being required. Plus, the magnet hospitals were saying that the masters programs were not providing graduates with the ability to participate in research and evidence based practice as a clinician on a team with PhDs. Plus they wanted graduates with a stronger background in policy, informatics, and epidemiology. The DNP is about 18 months longer than a MS. It is a clinical doctorate like the MD, not a research degree like the PhD.

The DNP will not erode the value of the MS in nursing - it will be a long time before the DNP will be the predominent degree. If later you decide you want that clinical doctorate, there will be post masters programs.

This is probably a lot more than you wanted to know!!!

I see you are in Pennsylvania. Due to Pennsylvania's strong school nurse certification, there are a lot of masters programs that are geared for the school nurse. What part of the state are you in?

luvschoolnursing, LPN · Mar 15, 2008

Thank you for your input! Wow! I am in southwestern PA, near Pittsburgh.

bergren · Mar 15, 2008

I am less familiar with that end of the state, but do a google search and contact some of the other programs in Pittsburgh - they will likely know who has all online.