Prerequisites courses for nursing program

verene, MSN · Sep 8, 2015

Why do you have to take all of the courses during the spring? Can you not space them out over the year? Also, be aware that frequently you cannot take a&p 2 until you have taken and passed a&p 1. Chemistry and Microbiology may also have pre-reqs you need to take before you can take them. (Perhaps this is why you can't take the core courses until spring?). In any case I would not recommend taking all 4 hard science classes at once for the sake of your sanity and of your GPA.

I am in a similar boat of being a non-degree seeking student returning to school and taking classes at the community college. As I have a prior BA I am not eligible for financial aid even if I were to declare a major. I have had to take fewer courses per term in order to be able to continue working and afford to pay tuition out-of-pocket. Yes it is taking me longer to get through them all than some one who can go to school full-time, but I've been using the longer time to really explore the nursing field, get volunteer experience, build connections through my work, and hopefully make myself an all-around stronger applicant by the time I am applying to schools this fall.

JilLVN · Sep 8, 2015

Where I go to school (Southern California) Chemistry is the pre-req for Micro so you can't take them in the same semester. You have to pass Chem first before being eligible. Why do you need them all done in the spring? Does your NP program you got accepted to start in the Fall semester so you need everything done in the Spring? I'm currently doing my pre-reqs for the RN program and I also need those same classes.

meanmaryjean, DNP, RN · Sep 8, 2015

I think you are putting a lot of unnecessary pressure on yourself. You don't HAVE to take all your prerequisites in one term. No one is holding a gun to your head. You don't HAVE to quit working to do this. You can spread them out, lengthen your timeline, save up some cash and just be a nurse a couple of years later. The choice is yours alone.

sfw57 · Sep 9, 2015

thank you for everyone's comments.

The reason I have to take all courses in one semester is because I want to go to accelerated MSN programs and they start in the summer. I have to have all prerequisites completed by then. I have no choice but to do spring. I am changing my career. I already have a Bachelors and a Masters and I am about to be 25 years old. I cannot support myself at all at the current job I am in. I am looking to get started on nursing school right away. I feel like I just cannot afford the time or money to wait to start my career, especially because I want to do a Masters program which will take some time.

Also, as I said I cannot support myself at the current job I am in. As far as taking all prerequisites in one semester. Is it really not doable? I am definitely not expecting it to be easy, but if I was taking 16 credits in one semester of hard science courses, I would not work at all. I never had the privilege of just focusing on school, so I feel like without worrying about working I can handle school alone. Graduate school was tough and I completed, I feel like I can handle undergraduate courses, especially without working. I love learning and I do well in school.

I should definitely look into if there are any prerequisites. Everyone keeps saying to wait. But I feel like I am just not in a position to wait. I guess I feel like I wasted so much time already and by this age I expected to be establishing a career. And again I am not sure how I can go on living for another year when I dont have enough income to do so, especially if I have to come up with money for school.

Has anyone successfully took all the prerequisites in one semester? In the accelerated nursing programs I will be taking 16+ credits, so I see it as a great way to get myself used to the hard work and amount of material.

sfw57 · Sep 9, 2015

Oh also, some schools have a 5 year max date on the courses they are willing to escape. Since I graduated from my Bachelors in 2012, the longer I wait the less likely my courses are going to be eligible. My biology I took in 2008, I am already worried will not work for a prerequisites. And I definitely cannot retake ALL of the courses.

emmy27 · Sep 9, 2015

thank you for everyone's comments.
The reason I have to take all courses in one semester is because I want to go to accelerated MSN programs and they start in the summer. I have to have all prerequisites completed by then. I have no choice but to do spring. I am changing my career. I already have a Bachelors and a Masters and I am about to be 25 years old. I cannot support myself at all at the current job I am in. I am looking to get started on nursing school right away. I feel like I just cannot afford the time or money to wait to start my career, especially because I want to do a Masters program which will take some time.
Also, as I said I cannot support myself at the current job I am in. As far as taking all prerequisites in one semester. Is it really not doable? I am definitely not expecting it to be easy, but if I was taking 16 credits in one semester of hard science courses, I would not work at all. I never had the privilege of just focusing on school, so I feel like without worrying about working I can handle school alone. Graduate school was tough and I completed, I feel like I can handle undergraduate courses, especially without working. I love learning and I do well in school.
I should definitely look into if there are any prerequisites. Everyone keeps saying to wait. But I feel like I am just not in a position to wait. I guess I feel like I wasted so much time already and by this age I expected to be establishing a career. And again I am not sure how I can go on living for another year when I dont have enough income to do so, especially if I have to come up with money for school.
Has anyone successfully took all the prerequisites in one semester? In the accelerated nursing programs I will be taking 16+ credits, so I see it as a great way to get myself used to the hard work and amount of material.

There's probably somebody out there who has done this successfully, so I'm not going to say it's impossible, but it really would be very, very difficult. In attempting to take all these prerequisites at once, you are really setting yourself up for, at best, a semester of needless stress and extremely hard-won success, and at worst, failure that could permanently derail your MSN plans.

A&P in particular is an extremely information-dense class- there's a lot of brute-force memorization involved that you simply can't shortcut- the only way to know what all the muscles are called is to just memorize all the muscles, and so on. It's a very time-consuming course even for excellent students for that reason. It's quite different from nursing classes, which are also information-dense but which have a large component of critical thinking that comes more easily to some than others- A&P is primarily about your ability to assimilate and retain huge amounts of information. Even for people who find memorization relatively easy (I'm one of them), it's a lot of work.

At most schools, all of the courses you're planning on taking involve both lecture and lab sections, which means a lot of time spent in the classroom that eats in to potential study time. And perhaps most importantly, all of these courses involve information that you must understand in order to excel in your MSN program and actually practice as an advanced practice nurse, so it really behooves you to take the time to fully grasp them. Cramming your way through A&P or micro won't do you any favors when you need to recall that information later in your studies, and faced with such a rigorous study schedule, you may find you have little choice but to cram and braindump just to maintain your grades.

I'm surprised to hear that this school packs A&P 1 and 2 in to one semester- I've never heard of that before. Most schools require 1 as a prerequisite to 2 because the concepts in 2 build on 1, and there's definitely a full semester of information in each course. Taking them concurrently was not allowed at my school because you'd be lost in 2 without having completed 1. I would doublecheck this plan with an academic advisor at the school to be sure it's actually feasible.

Likewise, chemistry is an extremely useful prereq to micro and physiology, so even if it isn't absolutely required by the school (and again, I'd check to see that it isn't), you'd probably do better to have taken it first, especially when it comes to the more advanced physiological concepts in A&P 2.

It may not have been the track you envisioned for yourself, but I promise you, 25 is not an advanced age to be starting a second career- even if you take two years to complete your prereqs, you'll likely find you're among the younger students in your program- and rushing to get ahead by one year won't be of any benefit if you wind up struggling so much that your grades suffer and damage your MSN prospects. I think that's a realistic concern with the semester you're planning. You might find yourself in a better position in the long run by taking the time to first find an employer with tuition reimbursement (many hospitals do this, and hospital experience can mean useful contacts and references when you apply to school or start your eventual job search as a nurse) , a school that does allow you to be degree-seeking and therefore draw loans, a living situation that allows you to support yourself on your current salary while taking a more reasonable course load, or some combination of the above.

I realize that's probably not the advice you were looking for, and some of those suggestions may not be workable in your particular situation, but then again, neither is going to school without loans or a job and while taking a crushing course overload.

mrsboots87 · Sep 9, 2015

Another question, if you cannot afford to live, how do you expect to pay for your MSN program? Those programs are very tough and take a lot of time so you would not be able to work full time most likely. Some do it and pass, but they are the exception and not the rule. Are you planning on private loan funding this venture? That would be a terrible idea in this job market. Do you already have student loan debt racked up? Because that makes loan funding your MSN an even worse idea.

If if you have family who can support you during school, then go for it. But if not, I don't see how you're planning to live at all.

You our are only 25. There is no rush. You are still very young. Chem is likely a pre req to micro. AP1 may or may not be a prereq to AP2. That will vary by school. There is a likelyhood that you won't even be aloud to take these courses together. There are other programs you can apply to and waiting a year won't kill you if you have to spread your classes out.

dream'n, BSN, RN · Sep 9, 2015

I am curious what your current Bachelor and Master degrees are in? The reason I ask is that nursing school is another animal altogether compared to most other studies. Sounds like you will be starting without any previous nursing knowledge and that will be very hard. Nursing isn't just knowledge you can cram in, it is a way of thinking. It is developing critical thought processing and prioritizing, which takes time to develop. You will need time to absorb the prerequisite basics so you will be able to put it all together in the higher level courses. If possible, I recommend that you don't rush through them too quickly. Nursing is a science, but also an art .

sfw57 · Sep 9, 2015

Wow I have to say, after EVERYONE telling me not to rush, I am starting to think may you are right. My undergraduate and graduate degrees are in Psychology. My masters is meant to prepare you for a Ph.D. in clinical psychology. And I have decided not to pursue a PhD (I have lots of reasons for it). I have been unemployed since I graduated in May. I applied to hundreds of jobs, been scammed a few times and still struggling very much living from couch to couch. A lot of the positions I was interested in were for psychiatric nurses. And if you are not familiar with the field of psychology and mental health, nurses and psychiatrists take a lot of the jobs.

I think I will take two classes per semester instead while still working full-time. Or would that still be too difficult? I think maybe I should apply for an Accelerated BSN then, since those usually dont start until Fall. I can take prerequisites in the Spring and Summer, and be ready by then. Then hopefully after becoming RN I can work in psychiatric and mental health settings and then apply to be MSN. Or should I just wait take one course per semester and then apply for MSN programs when the time is right? I am pretty certain psychiatric nurse practitioner is what I want to do and I want to be in the advanced level of nursing where I can also be a researcher and a leader.

Now I do understand nursing is pretty different from psychology. I have been doing lots of research and I am confident I can succeed and be great at it. It also has lots of similarities with psychology. Both professions are about helping others and require similar skills of empathy, direct care, science driven, etc.

As far as paying for nursing schools, I was going to take off loans. Since I will be seeking a degree at that point, I didnt think I would have problems taking out student loans. Also, I would be applying to every scholarship I can find. I don't have any understanding loans, as I worked very hard to pay them off as they were coming in at schools. I understand how time consuming nursing schools are and I have begun to accept the idea of not being to work at all while in nursing school.

HouTx, BSN, MSN, EdD · Sep 9, 2015

It sounds as if you are getting a much better idea of how complex this career transition is going to be. Going for your BSN first - then practicing in Behavioral Health before moving on to an NP is a much better approach. Most NP programs will require prior experience in the specialty in order to be accepted. When all is said and done, NPs are nurses... which means completion of a generalist RN education program first.

I'm also thinking you may be a bit fuzzy on the role of NPs. These folks are practitioners. NP education does not focus on development of leadership or administration skill sets. Nurse researchers have doctoral preparation. If you want to be a primary investigator, it will take a DNS or PhD not a DNP.

Please be very cautious with incurring large amounts of student loan debt. Although it is common knowledge that this type of debt cannot be discharged via any normal means, it is not well known that in most states, nurses (or other licensed professionals) who are in default on student loans are unable to renew their licenses, so it is a double-whammy that sometimes comes as a very nasty surprise.

Best of luck on your transition plans.

Tinkk · Sep 9, 2015

Please take my advice and do NOT take more than a few science classes in one semester. Actually, better yet, only take one if you can. You also can't take A&P II without taking A&P I first (at least this is how it works at most schools). You will also save more money in the long run.