pre reqs

Nursing Students Pre-Nursing

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Ive heard people say it takes 2 years to do them. How mant classes are These people taking, ans how many classes did they take a semester. At my CC pre reqs are only 4 classes amd you can finish them in 1 semester

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It all depends on the schools requirements and what kind of background the person already has...as well as if the person is taking classes full time or part time, and including summers.

I know for me, the school im trying to go to requires 8 classes (all the non nursing classes)

However my circumstances that ended up being 9 classes since micro and A&P both had a bio prerequisite or sciences in high school in last 5 years (which i had, but 10 years ago). So ended up being what i could do in a year, taking classes full time, spring and fall, as well as class in summer.

Other people may have more prerequisites to the prerequisites to take, basic english before english 101, basic math classes, and so on.

Then there are some schools which may have restrictions on when one can take classes. Like obviously A&P 2 must have A&P 1 first, but if any further limits are on classes with the school, like micro required before A&P 1, or A&P 2 required before micro, or a basic bio prereq (like my case) that extends prereqs to at least 3 terms. If not taking prereqs in summer, that makes it a year and a half

Also some people may not be able to work on prerequistes full time. They may be taking only 2 classes a term until they are in nursing

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I cam take a&p now and micro later on does that mean im going to get my butt kicked bt a&p because i have no background in micro?

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Specializes in Critical Care, Clinical Documentation Specialist.

Since I am going for my Bachelor's, I need 60 credits of lower class courses before I can apply to the University Nursing School. These credits include the usual nursing pre-reqs of A&P, Micro, Stats, etc. These took me two years. However, I changed which school I will be applying to and they have 4 additional pre-reqs that I don't have (Biochem, Pathophysiology, Pharmacology and a different nutrition class than what I took). So, the additional classes added a year, albeit part time, to my 4 year graduation plan.

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My school has 15 pre req classes and that's not counting the math/gen ed requirements

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Micro before a/p or a/p before micro or really doesn't matter which order depends on your school. The a/p professors will teach the classes differently if they know all the students have had micro.

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I'm getting mine done in two years, but I am getting five total done in the summer when they offer accelerated classes (3 classes this summer, 2 next summer).

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It definitely depends on the individual school, as well as where you're coming from. I already had my Bachelor's when I started my prereq's (in a foreign language, so no science background), so I had things like the English and Sociology/ Anthropology requirements, but I did have to take speech, stats, a 100 level bio so that I could take micro and anatomy and physiology and psych. I could have finished one semester earlier if I had taken A, P and Micro in the same semester (A & P are taught separately at the school I took them at, so it was possible to take them concurrently), but I was pregnant (due a week after finals week), so the idea of spending that much time at school, when I could barely stay awake in general, just wasn't going to work. These classes were to either go to our local community college (with a 3 yr waiting list) or the Master's Entry Program that I just finished.

One of the local state colleges had just started an accelerated/ 2nd degree BSN program, so I went to an information session to find out about it. If I went to that school, I would have had to take 13 additional classes- their requirements were ridiculous and really only made sense if you got your bachelor's within the same state system. I think when I looked it up, it would have taken me another 2+ yrs, and I was already done with the science prereq's, and I already had a BA.

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My bachelors program required 30 credits (quarter credits, it's a different number for semesters) basically they wanted one year of classes complete before entering the program.

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Specializes in Med/Surg, Academics.

Because I took them so slowly, it took me longer to finish my pre-reqs (about 30 hours) then it will to take 60 hours for my accelerated BSN program!

I had control over the speed of my pre-reqs. Usually, the nursing curriculum is set, and you can't control how fast or slow you go through it once you pick a program.

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56 credit hours for my pre-reqs, going part-time, two years to complete, two classes at a time.

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Beware that many high schools nowadays are either offering college level English and science classes as part of the curriculum, or they are allowing students take college classes and use those in place of standard high school fare. So, scrutinize the nursing school's pre-admission requirements, because some of them kind of bury it in there that you need college chemistry or general biology or basic human structures, or something, but they assume that you got it in high school or before you applied to nursing. Sample of HS requirements for an ADRN (I lifted this from an online catalog):

A.High School Requirements

Completion of the following with a “C” or better:

4 units of English

3 units of social sciences

2 units of mathematics (one of which is Algebra)

2 units of science (one of Biology and one of Chemistry)

with a related laboratory or the equivalent

or

Successful completion of the G.E.D. Test.

Persons out of High School for five or more years:

Unless college level courses in Chemistry or Biology (not

Human Biology) have been completed with a grade of

“C” or better within the five years prior to admission to

the program, such courses will be required for acceptance.

(CHEM105, Principles of Biological Chemistry is

strongly recommended.)

The "Big 8 or 9" always required, for most college programs or diploma programs I looked at:

Human Anatomy

Human Physiology

Microbiology (might be General, or might be a special nursing-oriented one, so check what's accepted by your program.)

Nutrition (you might need one that makes you do diet plans - definitely check what your nursing program accepts or requires)

English I -- College Composition I

Psych -- Introduction to Psychology

Psych -- Human Growth & Development

Chemistry - freshman chem, 1 or 2 semesters, for some diploma programs. You need it for BSRN. So take it anyway.

CPR for Health Care Providers and possibly also including a customized First Aid training

Required for most college degree programs and "maybe" for a diploma RN:

Chemistry -- freshman chemistry , one or two semesters; possibly a survey course of organic chemistry

College Algebra - It will never hurt you. You need algebra for pharm calcs.

Comp 101 -- general computer use course for using Microsoft Office

English II -- Business and Professional Speaking

Phys ed -- at least one semester; maybe two

Soc 101 -- Principles of Sociology

Sometimes:

Ethics -- usually a philosophy course

Psych -- Abnormal Psych (need it for BSRN anyway)

Stat 101 -- Statistics course (for BSRN, but useful for other things)

Strategies for Academic Success / College Study Skills -- a freshman level "study habits" class

That roadmap ought to take all the mystery out of it. Those are general requirements that I found most schools require. Your mileage may vary, hehe. You really need to study the nursing school catalogs, and if you plan to transfer credits in ,you need to find out for certain which schools' specific courses are accepted or not. Nutrition is the one I have seen multiple schools get their knickers in a knot over. Apparently, everyone has a different concept of what shold be in the course, in addition to the basics of nutrition, which are the same for all humans, lol.

But if you know that your goal is BSRN or higher, why not cram as much of that gen ed and science as you can into your pre-work. Having it under your belt will definitely make the PAX and HESI preadmission tests a piece of cake. Nowadays, there are many displaced-worker adults with BA/BS and masters degrees and work experience competing with you high school students and freshmen college students for seats in nursing schools. That raises the bar for you, so far as performance on those preadmission tests.

Attending community colleges (they have lower tuition costs) and living with parents while getting as much college done as possible cuts the total cost.

The diploma RN programs or at least the savvy and well-run ones, have upgraded themselves to be essentially a ADRN with some general ed stripped out. Diploma schools realized that their grads would need to be upgradeable to BSRN, and that the school could not turn out a RN grad who is significantly less trained than an ADRN or BSRN, because then the diploma school has problems getting its students to pass the NCLEX.

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