Samuel Merritt University ABSN Spring 2023

U.S.A. California

Published

Hello everyone! This is a space for people to share their application journey as well as stats! This will be my second time applying. Good luck everyone!

On 10/20/2022 at 12:55 AM, coffeebeans said:

Hey guys, just wanted to give you a heads up if you are planning to go here/apply here in the future. SMU has decided to not offer 1 on 1 preceptorships during senior synthesis. Instead they are giving us these horrible virtual simulations and projects to do. Please consider this before you fork out 90k to go here. The admin doesn’t care about the students’ opinions. The current ABSN cohorts are pissed about this change and even more upset that this change was not communicated to us. We had to hear it from students in the cohorts above us. Please spread the word since SMU is refusing to advertise this to current and future students. 

Hi @coffeebeans, would you mind sharing which campus and cohort you're in? Also, did the school give a reason for this change?  I just spoke with someone at the Sac campus who just graduated and completed a preceptorship during senior synthesis.

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1 hour ago, Ravenia_Fox said:

Hi @coffeebeans, would you mind sharing which campus and cohort you're in? Also, did the school give a reason for this change?  I just spoke with someone at the Sac campus who just graduated and completed a preceptorship during senior synthesis.

 As far as we know now, the San Mateo campus is for sure being affected. We have been hearing mixed things about the Oakland campus. The aren’t any changes to the Sac campus. I’m currently at the San Mateo campus. Our November ‘22 cohort wasn’t told about the changes until last minute when they recently found out that there was only 14 available preceptor spots for 40+ students. The remaining students were told to do Vsim and get certifications (which the students had to pay out of pocket). The January ‘23 cohort were told that there would be no preceptorship for them and they would all be doing Vsim and certifications. The April ‘23 and June ‘23 cohort have been trying to reach out to the admin to find out what the plan is but several admin have been ignoring their emails. We don’t know if these changes have been approved by the Board of Nursing and we don’t want our degrees to be at risk. The lack of communication is absolutely frustrating and we know this issue isn’t being shared to upcoming cohorts/people applying to this program so we want to spread the word. 

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On 10/22/2022 at 12:52 PM, coffeebeans said:

 As far as we know now, the San Mateo campus is for sure being affected. We have been hearing mixed things about the Oakland campus. The aren’t any changes to the Sac campus. I’m currently at the San Mateo campus. Our November ‘22 cohort wasn’t told about the changes until last minute when they recently found out that there was only 14 available preceptor spots for 40+ students. The remaining students were told to do Vsim and get certifications (which the students had to pay out of pocket). The January ‘23 cohort were told that there would be no preceptorship for them and they would all be doing Vsim and certifications. The April ‘23 and June ‘23 cohort have been trying to reach out to the admin to find out what the plan is but several admin have been ignoring their emails. We don’t know if these changes have been approved by the Board of Nursing and we don’t want our degrees to be at risk. The lack of communication is absolutely frustrating and we know this issue isn’t being shared to upcoming cohorts/people applying to this program so we want to spread the word. 

It doesn't matter if you are San Mateo or Oakland... SMU won't be able to provide preceptorships for you! They told our cohort that the larger idea is to phase those out completely and start calling the class something completely different. Essentially, they are petitioning to the Board of Registered Nursing that it will be better to have a project-based class with powerpoint presentations, case studies, and virtual simulations. In reality, this will look like a lot of time behind your computer gaining no learning. None! I have done countless vsims across multiple semesters, as they could not provide me hours for many semesters. 

Get used to your emails being ignored or if you get an email back be prepared for them to flat-out lie! I am really not exaggerating here and I am glad that other students are speaking out. I know it is exciting to be accepted into a school that once had a good reputation and especially if everyone worked so hard on their pre-requisites but trust us when we say that this feeling will not last past your first week at SMU. 

State schools might not be perfect or schools more inland but at least you are not going so deep into debt about out. SMU is willing to lie to the Board of Nursing to justify the lack of actual patient exposure you will get. I can't tell you how much they are inflating hours of patient-exposure that has never happened. Thay might be nice in some undergraduate programs but not if you are going to be a nurse of any kind. You need to know what to do and how to be a hand-on nurse. 

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I can corroborate the previous two posters about the seriously lacking clinical placements and senior synthesis/preceptorship at SMU. I am in my 5th semester of the ELMSN program at the Oakland campus; the first 5 semesters are all pre-licensure so essentially what the ABSN does in 12 months we do in 16 months. 

My observations and experiences are that since Samuel Merritt's disaffiliation from Sutter which went into effect Jan 2022, the school now no longer has good relationships with Sutter hospitals. Sutter was previously SMU's main connection to good, reliable clinicals. Sutter took a $200million loss from SMU disaffiliating, so there are legitimate reasons and palpable resentment from Sutter hospitals towards SMU. 

Further, SMU's clinical coordination team, and the administration as a whole are at best incompetent, at worst neglectful. They are unable to process documents timely, which means they turn in documents to hospitals for clinicals late, they've turned in documents to the BRN late, etc. Every semester we learn that other local nursing schools have snagged clinicals months before SMU even begins to ask for them. 

Lastly, SMU doesn't have the clinical instructors to support the amount of students they admit. Clinical instructors are sick or unavailble- it falls on the student to somehow make those hours up which can include coming in to clinical during academic breaks or during other courses entirely.  And god forbid you get sick- they don't follow their syllabus or student handbook policies for makeups. 

If you don't believe me or the other two posters, check out the yelp for all of the consistent feedback being given. 

https://www.yelp.com/biz/samuel-merritt-university-oakland?sort_by=date_desc

If you have ANY other options: you got into another program at a public school, you're on the waitlist/lottery for a local ADN program, or you have a good job you can keep working for a few years while you reapply elsewhere... DO IT. I wish I had done anything but go to this school.

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Has anyone reported these issues directly to the California Board of Registered Nursing? It's hard for me to believe that they would find this acceptable. 

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21 minutes ago, alyssajeannn said:

Has anyone reported these issues directly to the California Board of Registered Nursing? It's hard for me to believe that they would find this acceptable. 

SMU fraudulently inflates the clinical hours we do in their reports to the board, and there's nothing we can do about that. There's no transparency there and students are not involved in that process. There's no official reporting option for nursing schools, just for individual nurses. I also looked into reporting to the accreditation bodies, but no options there either.

Until SMU has to repeatedly delay students' graduation on a larger scale, I don't know if their accreditation will ever be questioned. 

I and some of my classmates have been looking for a way to hold the school responsible for months- gone through every word on every covid waiver related to clinical education, and everything else we can find regarding curriculum. The BRN keeps it so vague what is required each semester or each course. SMU uses this to their advantage. 

 

This is what we've come to accept is the only way to change the school's reputation: widepsread alerting in all public and non-public forums. You'll see students from different campuses and in different programs in the school of nursing on yelp, reddit, and here. The school has a chokehold on local media, so even as the school is spending billions of dollars on a new campus in Oakland where they publicly state they intend to quadruple their enrollment, there's no fact-checking or corroborating evidence to suggest that their quality of education has remained or will remain up to par. This is literally our only option. I hope you read the sincerity and desperation in all of our writing, because we're miserable and trapped. 

 

 

Oh, and we're more broke/in debt than any other nursing student in the area. So that adds insult to injury.

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Does anyone have an update about the waitlist movement? 

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Got off of the waitlist! I was in position #3 for the Sacramento campus. 

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Current ABSN student in the Oakland cohort here.

Just wanted to support what @rjay01, @coffeebeans and @AlmostNurse90 have reiterated regarding the hesitancy of applying to SMU and its current situation with the absence of arranged preceptorships and poorly organized clinical rotations. It has been quite depressing to know that this is affecting all 3 campuses, and also affecting many of the BSN cohorts as well. This was not communicated to us in a transparent and coherent manner by administration, despite numerous virtual town hall sessions held by admin.

There will be a couple of new grad programs/positions that will require preceptorships, so I am worried for what jobs I can qualify or apply for given this sudden change. I urge anyone that is considering to apply, re-apply or accept to re-consider or take a moment to read through what other current students are sharing and experiencing first before deciding. Good luck!

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Hi folks, I realize many of you may not have started the SMU ABSN program yet, but in case you happen to know... I wonder if any of you (ideally those at the San Mateo campus, but would love to hear about Oakland as well) can provide some insight about schedules and hybrid/virtual vs. in-person classes/labs/sims/etc.

1. I am curious to know how many days/week you need to be on site in San Mateo vs. attending classes/labs remotely. Are didactic class hours/clinicals/labs typically between 9 am-5 pm? Or are some scheduled during early morning/evening hours?

2. Also, can you provide a sense of how many days/week clinicals are?

3. Is there a list of potential clinical sites? Trying to get a sense of how far they are from the SM campus. 

4. Are there any required weekend clinicals/labs/sims/classes?

Thanks in advance for any answers/guidance you can provide!

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