Doctor of Nursing Practice

The Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) is offered through the Southern California CSU DNP Consortium, which includes the CSU campuses of Fullerton and Los Angeles. The DNP is a professional practice degree designed to prepare nurses in advanced practice for complex practice and leadership roles in the clinical setting as well as teaching roles at California's community colleges and at the California State University. Students admitted into the program will be able to draw on faculty expertise across three large institutions. Specialty areas include Anesthesia, Clinical Nurse Specialist, Management/Administration/Leadership, Midwifery, Nurse Practitioner and Community Health Nursing. The DNP program is an extremely demanding and rigorous academic experience designed to prepare nurses to assume the highest levels of nursing professional practice. In addition to developing advanced competencies in evidence-based practice, leadership, health policy and advocacy, graduates will develop in-depth skills in a focused area of nursing practice. Students will complete a total of 1,000 clinical hours in practicum experience.

Applicants seeking admission to the DNP program must have:

A master’s degree, from an accredited institution, in nursing or a health-related field (i.e., public health or health administration) and national certification as an APRN (CNM, CNS, CRNA or NP) for preparation as clinicians, leaders or educators (direct care track)

OR

A master’s degree in nursing from an accredited institution in nursing leadership or administration, nursing education or community health nursing for preparation as nurse educators or nurse leaders (indirect care track), and national certification in a clinical nursing specialty

Official transcripts from all institutions ever attended

A grade point average of at least 3.0 on a 4.0 scale in overall prior graduate coursework attempted

Prerequisite courses for admission include:

Master’s level courses in Advanced Physical/Health Assessment, Advanced Pathophysiology, and Advanced Pharmacology for the direct care track only

Master’s level courses in core nursing areas such as nursing theory, research and transcultural nursing

TOEFL: 550 or 80 iBT

IELTS: 6.5

PTE: 58