NAU clinical hours, program by program
Both of Northern Arizona University's family nurse practitioner routes, the MS and the post-master's certificate, require 780 clinical hours across three practicums, with a minimum of 500 supervised by faculty in the family population focus. NAU lists the PMHNP practicum in units rather than hours, and sets the DNP at 1,000 hours with 240 or more earned at NAU. Choose your track in the planner that follows; the sections after it explain where the figures come from.
Plan every clinical hour
Tell us your NAU program and where you live. A placement advisor maps preceptors to each practicum on your plan of study.
Pick your NAU program
Your clinical courses and hours, who can precept you, where, and when to start looking. From NAU's own catalog and program pages.
- Who precepts
- A licensed physician or APRN with a year of experience in a comparable population focus; nurse preceptors nationally certified
- Where
- Family primary care across the lifespan, with pediatric and women's health hours; near home keeps travel down
- Start looking
- Green Form by March 31, June 30 or October 31; documents on file two months before clinicals
- Who precepts
- The same preceptor standard as the MS FNP, set by Arizona rule R4-19-502
- Where
- Family primary care sites that see every age group
- Start looking
- The three practicums run in sequence, summer, fall and spring
- Who precepts
- A psychiatric mental health preceptor who meets Arizona's rule; confirm specifics with your program coordinator
- Where
- Psychiatric settings with direct patient care; NUR 680 requires in-person engagement
- Start looking
- Ask early: NAU publishes no PMHNP hour total or deadline beyond the FNP Green Form dates
- Who precepts
- A psychiatric mental health preceptor approved by NAU
- Where
- In-person psychiatric care settings
- Start looking
- Nine units of NUR 680 for NPs, thirteen for non-NP MSN graduates
- Who precepts
- A mentor employed at the site who is not your supervisor, a relative or another DNP student
- Where
- An agency you choose, with an affiliation agreement
- Start looking
- The DNP is not accepting applications; current students confirm hours with the DNP Coordinator
Every program's clinical requirement at a glance
Five NAU graduate programs include precepted clinical time: the MS FNP emphasis, the post-master's FNP certificate, the MS PMHNP emphasis, the PMHNP graduate certificate and the DNP, now closed to new applicants. The figures come from different documents and years, so the table names each source.
| Program | Clinical courses | What NAU publishes | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| MS Advanced Practice, FNP emphasis | NUR 661, NUR 663, NUR 665 | 780 hours (180 + 300 + 300) | 2022-23 FNP Clinical Guidelines; graduate handbook AY 21-22 |
| Post-master's FNP certificate | NUR 661, NUR 663, NUR 665 | 780 hours, same split | The same hours table, headed for MS-FNP and the post-master's certificate |
| MS Advanced Practice, PMHNP emphasis | NUR 680 (13 units), NUR 689 (4 units) | Units only; no hour total | 2026-27 catalog |
| PMHNP graduate certificate | NUR 680 (9 or 13 units) | Units only; no hour total | 2025-26 catalog |
| DNP (not accepting applications) | NUR 703, NUR 608 | 1,000 hours, at least 240 at NAU | 2026-27 catalog; 2022-23 DNP Practicum Handbook |
| CNS prescribing course bundle | None | No precepted hours | 2025-26 catalog |
| RN to BSN | None | Clinical projects in your own community, hours unstated | 2025-26 catalog |
The FNP numbers are the firmest, with an identical 180, 300 and 300 split in both handbooks. For the PMHNP, no NAU document that can still be opened states an hour total.
How NAU turns units into hours
NAU's graduate programs tie clinical time to credit at 60 hours per unit. The FNP practicums show the pattern on the current catalog units: NUR 661 carries 3 units and 180 hours, while NUR 663 and NUR 665 carry 5 units and 300 hours each. The 2022-23 DNP Practicum Handbook states the ratio outright, equating one credit of NUR 703 with 60 practicum hours.
Apply that ratio to the PMHNP practicum and NUR 680 at 13 units comes to about 780 hours, while the 9-unit version for practicing NPs comes to about 540. That is our arithmetic, not a figure NAU has published, so get the real total from your program coordinator before you build a preceptor's schedule on it. The NUR 680 guide sorts what is published from what is not.
One wrinkle: the AY 21-22 graduate handbook listed every FNP practicum at 3 credits, while the catalog gives NUR 663 and NUR 665 5 units apiece. The hours match in both, so your log is unaffected.
The 500 faculty-supervised hours sit inside the 780
The 500 is part of the 780, not a block on top of it. It traces to R4-19-502, the Arizona Board of Nursing rule for APRN programs, which sets a floor of 500 faculty-supervised clinical hours per role and population focus and lets programs use preceptors to add to faculty-directed learning rather than replace faculty. Because the rule sets that floor per population focus, the PMHNP track has to meet it too, whatever total NAU sets.
NAU's 2022-23 FNP guidelines word the 500 two ways, once as faculty-supervised practice and once as hours from direct supervision, while the same pages call preceptor supervision indirect and give course faculty the job of overseeing immersion experiences and serving as liaison with the agency. Your course faculty decide how that oversight is arranged and recorded, so ask about it in the first week of NUR 661, not the last week of NUR 665.
What makes an hour count
An hour counts when it happens in the right course, with an approved preceptor present, at a cleared site, on a day NAU allows. NAU's 2022-23 handbooks set these conditions:
- A preceptor on site. Students may not be in the clinical setting unless their preceptor is present.
- An approved preceptor and site. Every preceptor needs the FNP Program Coordinator's sign-off, and NAU needs an affiliation agreement with the site, your own employer included. See who can precept you.
- Clearance first. Clinical documents are due two months before the rotation, and NAU tells you when you may begin.
- Weekdays in term time. Clinical during university breaks, holidays or weekends is off limits unless the FNP Program Coordinator approved it beforehand.
- A record. Credentials and the preceptor's evaluation of you go into NAU's tracking system, Typhon in the 2022-23 guidelines and Exxat in later mentions. The tracking guide covers both.
- DNP only. No patient hours in private homes, and course faculty plus the DNP Coordinator sign off on each activity beforehand.
Thinking of a Saturday clinic day to catch up? Under the 2022-23 FNP guidelines, weekend clinical time needs the FNP Program Coordinator's approval before the shift, not after it.
How the hours fall across the calendar
The FNP practicums run in a fixed order, summer, fall, then spring, and each one is a prerequisite for the next, so the 780 hours land in about twelve months. The paperwork for each term runs well ahead of it: a Green Form date on the 2022-23 form (the 2021-22 form set each date a month earlier) and clinical paperwork complete two months ahead of the rotation.
| Practicum | Term | Hours | Green Form date (2022-23 form) | Upcoming term dates |
|---|---|---|---|---|
NUR 661 | Summer | 180 | March 31 | Summer 2027 sessions begin May 10, 2027 |
NUR 663 | Fall | 300 | June 30 | Fall 2027: Aug. 23 to Dec. 10 |
NUR 665 | Spring | 300 | October 31 | Spring 2027: Jan. 11 to May 7; Spring 2028: Jan. 10 to May 5 |
PMHNP and DNP timing is looser. NUR 680 is a variable-unit course, listed at 1 to 13 units, and NAU's DNP project rules schedule NUR 703 for the last four terms, so your plan of study shows when those hours fall. For weekly targets inside each term, see pacing your clinical hours.
Why every figure here carries a date
NAU has stopped publishing its graduate clinical handbooks online. The hour rules on this page come from archived copies of the 2022-23 FNP Clinical Guidelines, the 2022-23 DNP Practicum Handbook and the graduate handbook for AY 21-22. The newest handbook known to exist, the 2023-24 APRN Clinical Handbook for FNP and PMHNP students, is offline with no archived copy, and the live catalog showed only error pages on the day this page was researched.
The FNP split has read 180, 300 and 300 in every version still available. Even so, the current rules sit with your program coordinator and course faculty, so confirm the totals, the dates and the tracking system with them as each practicum opens.
Planning every hour with us
What sets our work apart for NAU students is scope: the plan covers every practicum on your plan of study from the start. For FNP students we line up preceptors for all three practicums together, weighted toward the pediatric and women's health time in the recommended hour mix, and close enough to home that 780 hours arrive without long drives or motel nights. For PMHNP students we look for psychiatric preceptors who can host the in-person work NUR 680 calls for.
Every candidate is screened against R4-19-502 the way NAU reads it: license, a year of experience, a comparable population focus and certification. Your advisor assembles the preceptor's paperwork, confirms the site has signed off, and tell you early if an affiliation agreement has to be started, so the Green Form reaches NAU complete and ahead of the cutoff. If your preceptor steps away mid-semester, we go straight back to searching for the next one. How it works lays out each step, or name your program in the form below.
Questions NAU students ask
Does time at my RN job count toward NAU's FNP clinical hours?
NAU's published FNP hours are earned inside NUR 661, NUR 663 and NUR 665, under a preceptor the FNP Program Coordinator has approved, and the 2022-23 guidelines describe no credit for RN work time. You can train at your own employer, but the site still needs an affiliation agreement; the workplace practicum guide explains the limits.
Can clinical hours from another NP program transfer into NAU's FNP track?
No NAU document that can still be read describes moving precepted hours into the FNP track. The DNP is the one NAU program with a published transfer rule, which lets up to 760 hours from a prior accredited graduate program count. If you completed NP clinicals elsewhere, raise it with the graduate nursing advisors before you enroll.
Is the PMHNP certificate shorter on clinical time if I am already a nurse practitioner?
In units, yes. The 2025-26 catalog lists 9 units of NUR 680 for students who are already NPs and 13 for MSN graduates who are not. NAU gives no hour figure for either path. At the 60-hours-per-unit pattern seen elsewhere in NAU's graduate programs, that works out to roughly 540 and 780, an estimate to check with your program coordinator.
What happens if I finish an FNP practicum short of its hours?
The archived guidelines do not cover that case, so course faculty set the options. Because each practicum is a prerequisite for the next, an unfinished one can hold up what follows. Raise it with faculty the moment a shortfall looks likely; the behind on clinical hours guide covers catching up.
Where do NAU graduate students record their clinical hours?
The 2022-23 FNP guidelines name Typhon for the license upload, credential documents and the preceptor's evaluation, while later NAU mentions name Exxat. No live NAU page says which one graduate NP students use today, so ask course faculty which system your cohort uses.
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.
- Northern Arizona University, FNP Clinical Guidelines AY 2022-23 (archived copy)
- Northern Arizona University, Graduate Student Handbook: Academics AY 21-22 (archived copy)
- Northern Arizona University Academic Catalog 2026-27, MS Nursing, Advanced Practice (archived copy)
- Northern Arizona University Academic Catalog 2026-27, Doctor of Nursing Practice (archived copy)
- Northern Arizona University, ABOR-approved term dates
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
Start your placement plan
Track, town and next practicum is all we need to begin.