Mississippi nurses in NAU's online NP programs
Northern Arizona University's licensure table marks all four of its NP plans Meets for Mississippi. What sets the state apart is the gatekeeper for clinicals: not the nursing board but IHL, Mississippi's Institutions of Higher Learning board, which reviews any outside school that trains students there. Plan on a review of up to three months, requested four months early.
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Mississippi in NAU's licensure table
| NAU plan | Mississippi |
|---|---|
| Nursing - Advanced Practice, Family Nurse Practitioner (MS) | Meets |
| Nursing - Advanced Practice, Psychiatric Mental Health Nurse Practitioner (MS) | Meets |
| Family Nurse Practitioner (GCERT) | Meets |
| Psychiatric Mental Health Nurse Practitioner (GCERT) | Meets |
NAU names the Mississippi Board of Nursing as the licensing link. Meets means the NP coursework fits Mississippi's education rules for licensure; it is silent on clinical approval, which in Mississippi belongs to a different agency altogether. How the table works is laid out in the licensure disclosure guide.
IHL review before clinicals in Mississippi
Mississippi divides the work most states give their nursing board. The Board of Nursing approves practical nursing (PN) programs. RN degree programs, graduate ones included, are measured against IHL's standards, and IHL expects any school from another state that sends undergraduate or graduate students into Mississippi clinicals to live up to those standards too.
Why a review? In IHL's view, a practicum on Mississippi soil domiciles the program in the state, creating physical presence, and that calls for an examination by IHL Nursing Education, which IHL estimates at up to three months. Its August 2024 procedures manual, Appendix S, sets the lead for programs governed from outside Mississippi at a minimum of four months before the start date. The school must separately hold SARA membership or, failing that, MCCA authorization; NAU is in SARA.
Whether NAU has been through an IHL review is a question for your program coordinator, best asked before a Mississippi preceptor commits. NAU's pages describe clinical sites throughout Arizona and publish no rule on graduate clinicals in other states; the state authorization guide explains NAU's SARA footing.
Collaborative practice and Mississippi's care map
AANP rates Mississippi reduced practice, with an unusual twist: the collaborative relationship an NP practices within must be board-approved, and the partner may be a Mississippi-licensed dentist as well as a physician. Your preceptor's own license, experience and certification still have to clear what NAU requires; the preceptor requirements page has the list.
Jackson leads the state's metros at about 610,000 residents. The University of Mississippi Medical Center is there, and so is Mississippi Baptist Medical Center, a hospital of the Memphis-headquartered Baptist Memorial Health Care. Our research names three more large systems, Singing River Health System, Forrest Health and North Mississippi Health Services, and two more metros, Hattiesburg and Gulfport-Biloxi. Each sets its own student process; the research lists no Mississippi preceptor incentive.
The Mississippi side of the Memphis metro is home to about 278,000 people. A clinic just north of the line is in Tennessee, where a 2026 bill would freeze approvals for out-of-state programs; read the Tennessee guide before looking there.
RN licensing for Mississippi clinical hours
IHL's standards reach APRN clinical courses directly: each post-licensure student must carry an unencumbered RN license for the state where the clinical hours are logged, a rule IHL applies to visiting programs as well. Arizona's rule for NAU lands in the same place, as the license guide explains.
Mississippi's compact licenses date from January 19, 2018. The Board's endorsement page explains that compact nurses in good standing practice across member states on their home state's license, and that an employer has no right to demand a remote-state license on top. A Mississippi resident with a multistate license therefore covers home clinicals and NAU's admission rule in one step. After graduation, NP practice requires a Mississippi APRN credential and the collaborative relationship described above, since the state has not adopted the APRN Compact.
Why Mississippi NAU students choose us
Mississippi's review clock rewards an early start, and ours begins months ahead. We settle the preceptor, the site and the dates in time for NAU to act on IHL's four-month lead if it needs to, well before the Green Form cutoffs.
Your placement advisor looks near home, in Jackson, on the Coast or in the Memphis suburbs, checks each candidate's license and collaborative arrangement, and assembles the CV, license and certification NAU asks for. We plan the full 780 FNP hours or the in-person NUR 680 placement in one pass, and we step in quickly when a preceptor withdraws.
Questions NAU students ask
Does NAU's PMHNP certificate meet Mississippi's requirements?
Yes. NAU's licensure table marks the PMHNP graduate certificate Meets for Mississippi, along with the MS PMHNP, the MS FNP and the FNP certificate. Kansas is the one state where the PMHNP certificate and the MS PMHNP part ways. The PMHNP certificate page covers units and the NUR 680 practicum.
Which agency clears an out-of-state program's clinicals in Mississippi?
In Mississippi that review sits with IHL's Nursing Education office, not the Board of Nursing. It regards clinical training by a program from outside Mississippi as the program being present in the state, and it allows up to three months for the review. NAU would be the school requesting the review, ideally four months ahead, so ask your program coordinator for its status.
Is a Mississippi RN license required for clinicals in Mississippi?
It must be an RN license that is unencumbered and valid in Mississippi. For a Mississippi resident that means a Mississippi license, ideally multistate so it also answers NAU's admission rule. A nurse living in another compact state can train in Mississippi on that state's multistate license, as long as it remains in good standing.
Does NAU's SARA membership cover Mississippi clinicals?
Partly. IHL gives an outside school two ways to meet its distance-education condition, SARA participation or an MCCA authorization for schools outside SARA, and NAU takes the SARA route. The Nursing Education review is a different requirement that SARA leaves untouched, so NAU's status on it still matters.
Related pages
Last checked 2026-09-27
We check these pages against Northern Arizona University's own catalog, program pages and published nursing documents. Your program coordinator and course faculty have the final word.
NAU welcomes a preceptor you arrange. We arrange one close to home.
Tell us your NAU track, your town and your next practicum. We line up preceptors who fit the course and Arizona's preceptor rule, confirm the site's approval, and gather the CV, license and certification the Green Form needs, well before NAU's cutoff.
- Preceptors matched to the course: all-ages family primary care for FNP, psychiatric settings for PMHNP
- License, experience and certification checked against the rule NAU applies, before the Green Form goes in
- All three FNP practicums planned together, near home instead of a long drive away
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