Samuel Merritt 2023 Applicants!! (ABSN/ELMFNP/ELMCM)

Nursing Students School Programs

Published

Hi everyone,

I thought I should start this thread where people can put their stats if they wish and give each other advice! I think decisions will come out in 2-3 months so we can discuss the timeline of acceptances too!

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I wonder when we will find out. I also appreciate you for making this thread. I have applied for the ELMS-CM and FNP program. 

 

TEAS: 92.7

GPA: 3.59

Science GPA: 3.68

Non-Science GPA: 4.0

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Accepted into the ABSN program!

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Hello,

I am currently an ELMNS student at SMU Sac and I would like to warn anyone attempting to go to this school. If you have ANY other options, please take them. The amount of money you pay for this degree is absolutely not worth it.  If you have any questions, please feel free to message me but unless you are absolutely dying and desperate to become a nurse, I HIGHLY recommend you consider other programs and avoid SMU. 

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31 minutes ago, YellowMaskrosbarn said:

Hello,

I am currently an ELMNS student at SMU Sac and I would like to warn anyone attempting to go to this school. If you have ANY other options, please take them. The amount of money you pay for this degree is absolutely not worth it.  If you have any questions, please feel free to message me but unless you are absolutely dying and desperate to become a nurse, I HIGHLY recommend you consider other programs and avoid SMU. 

I would like to hear your pros and cons about the program.

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Hi, I can not agree more with the student from the ELMSN program in Sac! I am an ELMSN student at the Oakland campus and regret my choice of attending SMU. As a graduate student you are locked in for the time of the program, you can't just stop after you get your RN license or if you do, you won't get a BSN only the RN license. The program is very poorly run by the program director. She takes no accountability for her leadership and will blame the teachers or students instead. She will smile at you but at the same time either fail you or intimidate you with poorly cited references. The director feels extremely challenged by anyone who advocates for themselves or questions her leadership, which just further proves my point. She tells you to critically think unless this will be applied to her. I believe that the school had a good reputation for a long time hence so many are still applying. My cohort and me made the same mistake. If we could do it all over again, we would do the 1 year ABSN and get the hell out of SMU. SMU is really bad at finding clinical placements for its students. You maybe get half the time in the hospital that they promise you. They have used a waiver from the board of Registered Nurses to get away with less time in the hospital, so instead you will sit at the computer and do virtual simulations. This will not prep you for your future job. SMU will absolutely deny any of this and promise you a great time. This is not true. I would not take the time out of my day, if I would not feel so compelled to do so. I really want to prevent others from being scammed into this school. I was lucky that some of my professors had been with the school for many years, but three of my wonderful professors also left the school since they were fed up with the leadership and how the program has been run by the director. New and inexperienced professors are being recruited now who have no teaching experience and don't know how to advocate for you, which is a problem. IF you have outside responsibilities such as a job or family, you will have a difficult time to attend to those. The school will change her schedule constantly and they will do this last minute much to the contrary of what they promised you. Even if you tell them you have to work on the weekends or have no childcare, they do not even consider such and will still place you on the weekends for the hospital. The poor cohort who just started now in Oakland has to pay roughly $5k for a mindfulness class, which blows my mind. I don't know how this will get you closer to passing your boards but the school makes sure they will receive their $5k per student. Please believe me that the other student from the Sac campus and me are not two individuals who are bitter and are venting, but we are representing the majority of our cohorts who truly want to warn people about this declining program. There are other programs out there that are much more affordable, and even if they might have their flaws, at least you won't be $180k in debt. 

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On 9/15/2022 at 10:53 AM, YellowMaskrosbarn said:

Hello,

I am currently an ELMNS student at SMU Sac and I would like to warn anyone attempting to go to this school. If you have ANY other options, please take them. The amount of money you pay for this degree is absolutely not worth it.  If you have any questions, please feel free to message me but unless you are absolutely dying and desperate to become a nurse, I HIGHLY recommend you consider other programs and avoid SMU. 

Hi! I am curious to know about your experience about this program. I tried to message you but it won't let the message send.

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Not quite sure why comments are getting deleted or why this thread is so silent. Any updates from people who applied? I appreciate the feedback so far and would like to know the pros and cons of the Sac campus!

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On 10/4/2022 at 8:13 PM, missvee said:

Not quite sure why comments are getting deleted or why this thread is so silent. Any updates from people who applied? I appreciate the feedback so far and would like to know the pros and cons of the Sac campus!

Hi, I don’t know why things get deleted but please read my post! And if you have more questions please let me know. 
sac campus is a bit better than Oakland in terms of getting clinical placements and caring and teaching their students. But Oakland is such a mess, please don’t get trapped by SMU!!

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4 minutes ago, AlmostNurse90 said:

Hi, I don’t know why things get deleted but please read my post! And if you have more questions please let me know. 
sac campus is a bit better than Oakland in terms of getting clinical placements and caring and teaching their students. But Oakland is such a mess, please don’t get trapped by SMU!!

Thank you so much for your response! I interviewed yesterday for CM Sac campus) and they mentioned they are changing the curriculum which is why the previous cohort is a little messy right now. Are there some positives to your experience so far? And are you in the FNP or CM program?

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1 hour ago, missvee said:

Thank you so much for your response! I interviewed yesterday for CM Sac campus) and they mentioned they are changing the curriculum which is why the previous cohort is a little messy right now. Are there some positives to your experience so far? And are you in the FNP or CM program?

I am not at the Sac campus but a "little messy" has to be the understatement of the year! SMU has been messy for the last 3-4 cohorts/years... I am in my second year, and my heart goes out to all the students who just started their journey in September. They did make changes to the curriculum, now you get to take a mindfulness class for 5k. Who needs this in a professional nursing school, and they dress it up with some fancy words. Most of the time you won't even have your schedule until 2 to 3 weeks into the semester. Whatever you are planning your responsibilities around and personal life such as work or children, have to be so flexible that it is quite rude of SMU. Your clinical sites won't be set in stone and change around and so will the day and time of your classes. The only positive of SMU has been my cohort, the people I have by my side to endure this inadequacy of the school. The problem with the ELMSN program is that you are on the hook for years. If you decide to drop out then you won't have anything and transferring to other schools is nearly impossible. SMU knows that they can exploit the ELMSN students that way. Talking to faculty members, I get the sense that there is so much shifting and replacing in leadership that the morale has suffered tremendously. 

I am in the FNP track and as I have mentioned before, I think the only program at SMU that is somewhat OK, is the ABSN. Get in and get out. Get your license within a year and then run and get experience and money! Get your CM or FNP later. Many nurses work in CM positions without having the CM masters degree. Good luck with your journey this is a big decision and I should not be the only one you rely on but I hope other students will speak up. Also, read the Yelp Samuel Merritt University page. It is quite telling and students have quite accurate accounts of what is happening. 

Did yo apply to other programs? 

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8 hours ago, AlmostNurse90 said:

I am not at the Sac campus but a "little messy" has to be the understatement of the year! SMU has been messy for the last 3-4 cohorts/years... I am in my second year, and my heart goes out to all the students who just started their journey in September. They did make changes to the curriculum, now you get to take a mindfulness class for 5k. Who needs this in a professional nursing school, and they dress it up with some fancy words. Most of the time you won't even have your schedule until 2 to 3 weeks into the semester. Whatever you are planning your responsibilities around and personal life such as work or children, have to be so flexible that it is quite rude of SMU. Your clinical sites won't be set in stone and change around and so will the day and time of your classes. The only positive of SMU has been my cohort, the people I have by my side to endure this inadequacy of the school. The problem with the ELMSN program is that you are on the hook for years. If you decide to drop out then you won't have anything and transferring to other schools is nearly impossible. SMU knows that they can exploit the ELMSN students that way. Talking to faculty members, I get the sense that there is so much shifting and replacing in leadership that the morale has suffered tremendously. 

I am in the FNP track and as I have mentioned before, I think the only program at SMU that is somewhat OK, is the ABSN. Get in and get out. Get your license within a year and then run and get experience and money! Get your CM or FNP later. Many nurses work in CM positions without having the CM masters degree. Good luck with your journey this is a big decision and I should not be the only one you rely on but I hope other students will speak up. Also, read the Yelp Samuel Merritt University page. It is quite telling and students have quite accurate accounts of what is happening. 

Did yo apply to other programs? 

When they showed me the curriculum, I didn't see the mindfulness course but I did see a mental health course. I wonder if thats actually the mindfulness one. I'm kinda regretting not applying to the ABSN program now because I didn't realize it was that bad. Despite this all, do you feel like you are prepared for the NCLEX? I'm currently applying to UCD and UCLA and waiting for some other apps to open up. I really appreciate your transparency. Tough decisions to make. I also am a little concerned as to why this thread is so quiet and not sure if that's telling of the program. Last year's thread had a lot more communication.

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