Question About Nursing Degrees

I don't know a lot about it but my dad just graduated from regis and I know they have an on-line nursing program. My dad had a degree in Business and took the year fast track program to RN. he loved it and had a job waiting for him when he graduated. He now works for the VA hospital in the ER.

Hi K.,

I too have been researching nursing degrees on-line. I have a BA in Communication Studies and now am considering becoming an RN/BSN. All I seem to be finding is RN to BSN on-line.
Here is a brake down of the differences.
LPN -Licensed Practical Nurse. You can become an LPN in about 2 years through community college. However, I haven't found an on-line program.
RN- Registered Nurse. You can be an RN (at least in Montana-where I live) without a bachelor's degree. Takes about 3 to 3 1/2 years of education in a nursing program through a college. Then you must take a state exam.
RN/ BSN- Registered Nurse with Bachelor of Nursing. About the same amount of time to earn. However, big jump in pay.
Again I haven't found an accredited school on-line to become an RN. Let me know if you find one!
:-) G.

I to wanted to go into nursing, here is the scoop:
You really can not get a nursing degree online. There are procedures learned that can not be taught online, there are also clinical requirements that you have to fufill.
There are two options: community college: you need to take about 5 pre-recs including anantomy, microbiology and some others. You need to take the anatamy to get on the waiting list which from what I understand takes about two years. Then once you are in the program takes two years and you will be an LPN after the first year and an RN after the 2nd.
A bachelors requires more pre-reqs, unless you already have a BA you can go to the UCHS with just the 5 science pre-reqs. Regis also has a program for college grads and so does metro, from what I undersatns these programs are super intense, like all day classwork, study at night and clinicals in-between. From what I understand there are certain hospitals that require a bachelors( like children's) but other than that duties, pay and the like are the same. I would do the community college route it is MUCH less expensive( although from what I understand many hospitlas are paying student loans because of the high demand for nurses)
Also, you have to do the program at their pace, you can't do it in your own time.
I decided this was WAY to much for my family at this time in my life, I have three kids and a husband who works alot and I did not want to leave my kids all the time! I do know nursing pays well and you can work part time if you like, that's why I was interested. Good luck to you, and enjoy that baby!

I am a R.N. I am reading these responses going HMMM? Are these people from Ogden Utah? I don't recognize the names of some of the schools that one response listed as being in this area. I am new to this website and I don't know if you can get a R.N. degree online or not. The way it worked for me was that I had to take the following classes before I could be accepted into a two year program:

College Algebra
Anatomy
Physiology
Biology
Microbiology
Psychology
English
Human Development
Nutrition
Chemistry

I think that's about it???Hmm...I think I also had to take a Cultural Geography class. I'm trying to remember if that was a class I took for nursing?? Anyway, after I took all these classes I applied for a two year program. After being accepted the program was four semesters long. One semester lasted about 4-5 months. Anyway, after my second semester we had a summer break for about two months. We had the option of taking the break or taking an extra L.P.N. transition course. I decided to take the course and then after I took the course I was allowed to take the state test to become a L.P.N. The state test was a couple hundred dollars. I passed and became a L.P.N. I got a job as a critical care nurse. I was offered a job at a Long Term Critical Care hospital making $19/hr. or I could work at the normal local hospital making $13/hr. I bet you can guess what I did. Being a long term critical care nurse was hard, and I was a new nurse. A year later I finished my R.N. degree and took the state boards and have now been a nurse for six years. I was a C.N.A. before that. Your first semester of the nursing program is becomiming a C.N.A. by the way. I am a nurse educator now and I taught the C.N.A. class. Now I teach the R.N. and L.P.N. in-services for a nursing home. The only hard part about being a nurse is they want you to work all the time but it's a good job and you never have trouble finding a job! Good luck.

S.

Hello I attend Kaplan University on-line and I love it. I just looked and they have some nursing programs on-line. Hope this helps. If you go to this web-site there is an orange box to click on that has all their on-line programs http://www.kaplan.edu/ku/default.aspx

Hi K.. Let me just tell you that nursing is a GREAT career. I have been a nurse for 5 years and still love it. One of the great things about nursing is there is SO many different areas you can go into. Example: I was a cardiac RN for almost 4 years and just moved to mom/baby.

You need to major in nursing. I went to Regis and did the traditional program. There are many schools that now offer nursing degrees in the area. Front Range, Arapahoe and Red Rocks Community College, UNC, CU, Regis just to name a few. However I don't think that there is an online program to get your LPN or RN. You can do online classes before you get into the nursing program but since nursing is such a hands on profession I think it is beneficial not to be online. I think there is an online course for RN to BSN. If you have more questions feel free to contact me.

You might want to look into being an EMT for the experience in Emergency medicine as well as to see if you like the medical field.