Online Nurse Practitioner Programs
(found programs from 71 schools)

For nurses with a bachelor's degree in nursing, a Nurse Practitioner (NP) program provides a step up on the career ladder. Nurse practitioners can function more independently than registered nurses who don't have an NP degree. Going back to school after you've already started working full-time can be difficult though, so a good bit of motivation is needed to overcome hurdles like not enough time for classes, and not enough money to pay for graduate school. Online or distance learning programs can help with that...

Affordable, Time Efficient and Family Friendly Online NP Degrees

Over the course of the last decade, distance learning programs have blossomed, making higher education possible for many students who otherwise wouldn't have been able to pursue an advanced degree in nursing. The ease of taking classes from your home, in your spare time, and yes, maybe even in pajamas, holds promise for people who are working and raising families. The money and time that can be saved by not driving to class grow more substantial as gas prices rise and roads and highways become more congested.

Clinical Rotations Close to Home

Clinical courses, unlike regular academic classes, are only taken in healthcare settings such as hospitals or clinics, with real live patients. That's the one part of an online NP program that cannot be done online. Telemedicine may change that in the future, but we're not totally there yet.

But for registered nurses pursuing a nurse practitioner degree, the fact that clinical courses can be taken close to home creates a great deal of efficiency, for both students and schools. Many universities and colleges make arrangements with clinicians in areas where students live. These "adjunct faculty" supervise your clinical work and report to your course instructor. You along with the online course instructor and local clinical-mentor make a plan for your clinical experience and then collectively monitor your progress along the way.

The downside of online NP programs, for some students, is the lack of face-to-face interaction with instructors and classmates. There is something to be said for "face-time" when it comes to learning, and some online NP programs do a better job of creating an online-community than others. Course work structure can have a big impact on student-to-student and student-to-instructor connectivity. Group projects and Skype discussion groups, for example, can boost the bonds between students and faculty as well as enhance the learning experience.

Physical college campuses, as compared to online programs without physical campuses, do have the advantage of cross-pollination with other academic disciplines, such as schools of medicine, public health, anthropology, and sociology - to name a few. Since nurses and nursing theorists often draw from other fields of study to improve care for patients, cross-discipline interaction is considered by many to be a vital part of academic integrity – this can get lost when working in isolation.

Spotlight on Georgetown University's Online FNP Program

Georgetown’s prestigious online FNP program awards RNs a Master of Science in nursing degree in either 17-18 months of full-time study or about 24-25 months of part-time study. The web-based learning and tailored clinical experiences create the ideal situation for career advancement - at your own pace. This innovative program is available to committed nursing professionals across the US.

Below is a complete list of nationally accredited online Nurse Practitioner (NP) programs.