NAU's Clinical Placement Coordinator and the other roles behind your clinicals

Updated September 27, 2026, reviewed by the NAU Preceptor placement team

In Northern Arizona University's 2022-23 FNP Clinical Guidelines, the Clinical Placement Coordinator receives your Green Form and secures or requests the site, the FNP Program Coordinator approves every preceptor and makes the final placement decision, course faculty serve as NAU's liaison with the agency, and graduate nursing advisors handle coursework and progression. Knowing which role owns which question can save you weeks.

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Table. Who handles what in an NAU FNP placement: Clinical Placement Coordinator, Green Form intake; securing, requesting or confirming the site; FNP Program Coordinator, Preceptor approval; final placement decision; break, holiday and weekend approvals; Course faculty, Indirect supervision; liaison — Who handles what in an NAU FNP placement: Clinical Placement Coordinator, Green Form intake; securing, requesting or confirming the site; FNP Program Coordinator, Preceptor approval; final placement decision; break, holiday and weekend approvals; Course faculty, Indirect supervision; liaison between

The roles at a glance

NAU's clinical documents name roles, not people, and so does this page. The titles below come from the archived 2022-23 guidelines. No current public NAU page lists a graduate clinical placement coordinator, so confirm today's titles with graduate advising or your course faculty.

Who handles what in an NAU FNP placement
Role	What the role handles	Ask them about
Clinical Placement Coordinator	Green Form intake; securing, requesting or confirming the site	Where your request stands; a site you want NAU to approach
FNP Program Coordinator	Preceptor approval; final placement decision; break, holiday and weekend approvals	Whether a preceptor, setting or schedule will be accepted
Course faculty	Indirect supervision; liaison between NAU and the agency	Problems at the site; course expectations
Graduate nursing advisors	Admissions, coursework, support resources	Plan of study, repeats, progression
Your preceptor	Direct supervision on site; evaluating your work	Daily schedule and clinical teaching
Site administrative contact	Receiving and routing the affiliation agreement	Contract questions at the agency

The Clinical Placement Coordinator

This is the role your Green Form is addressed to. The form describes its own purpose as bringing the Clinical Placement Coordinator in, either to secure a preceptorship you have arranged or to request one you want. Along with the FNP Program Coordinator and your course shell, this coordinator can also hand you a blank copy.

The earlier 2021-22 form described the same work as a clinical coordination team, where a team member would help obtain a placement or confirm the rotation with the proposed site. When NAU has no affiliation agreement with the agency, the details you supply on the form are what set one in motion.

The coordinator is also one of two people who must receive written notice if you withdraw your consent for NAU to release background, drug-screen, insurance and immunization records to clinical facilities. That release, signed through an appendix to the guidelines, is how a site learns that you are cleared.

The FNP Program Coordinator

This role carries the authority. The 2022-23 guidelines put it in two sentences: "All preceptors and mentors will be approved by the FNP Program Coordinator," and "Final decisions regarding clinical placement reside with the FNP Program Coordinator."

The same coordinator must give prior approval for any clinical time during university breaks, holidays or weekends, follows up on clinical incidents, and receives the records-release revocation notice alongside the Clinical Placement Coordinator. If you want to know whether a particular preceptor, specialty or schedule will pass, this is the office whose answer counts. Our preceptor requirements page covers the criteria it applies.

For nurses whose work rota leaves only weekends open, that approval matters a great deal. Ask early and in writing, before the Green Form goes in, rather than assuming weekend days will count. The pacing guide shows how the weekday math works for 180 and 300 hours.

Course faculty and your preceptor

Course faculty in NUR 661, NUR 663 and NUR 665 "provide indirect supervision and oversight of immersion experiences and work on behalf of the SON as a liaison between the university and agency," in the guidelines' words. SON is the older name, the School of Nursing; today it is the Maria and Steve Sanghi College of Nursing.

Your preceptor is the one who supervises you directly. Arizona's rule for APRN programs lets preceptors enrich faculty-directed clinical learning but not take the place of faculty, which is why your course faculty stay involved even if you never meet them on site. In the 2022-23 guidelines the preceptor's evaluation of the student was completed online in Typhon.

When something goes wrong at a site, such as a preceptor who keeps cancelling days, a conversation with course faculty is a natural starting point, because they are NAU's link to the agency.

Graduate nursing advisors

Advisors sit outside the placement chain but shape it. NAU's advising page lists graduate advising apart from undergraduate advising, and advisors help with admissions, coursework and support resources. Current students book them through NAU's online appointment scheduler at appointments.nau.edu.

Go to an advisor when a clinical problem turns into a plan-of-study problem: a practicum that has to move terms, a course that must be repeated, or a question about time limits. Under the 2021-22 graduate handbook, a first C or F may be repeated with advisor approval, and NAU policy allows six years to finish a master's degree. The progression rules page has the details, and our guide to NAU student systems covers the tools you will use to reach each office.

PMHNP, DNP and students who move

The coordinator titles shift by program. Search-engine text from the removed 2023-24 APRN handbook refers to "the student's Program Coordinator" approving preceptors, which would put PMHNP approvals with the PMHNP program coordinator, but the document itself cannot be read. DNP students worked with the DNP Coordinator, and their Mentor Statement of Agreement carried the signatures of course faculty and the DNP Program Coordinator.

If you relocate, another office joins in. NAU asks students who move to another state to update their physical location in LOUIE or on the Change of Location form, and to contact their academic program about the effect on experiential work such as practicums. The state authorization guide explains why that matters.

Where our placement desk fits

NAU's coordinators make the decisions. Our placement desk works for you, the student, and builds the package you hand them: a preceptor near home who meets R4-19-502 as NAU applies it, the CV, license and certification, a named administrative contact, and a site that has already approved the rotation. Nothing in that packet is left for NAU's team to chase.

With that in hand you can file a Green Form with the first box checked, comfortably before the cutoff, and with an early read on whether the practice needs a new affiliation agreement. We plan every FNP practicum together and stay on hand through the term to line up a new preceptor if one withdraws. Tell us about your program on the contact form.

Questions NAU students ask

Does NAU still have a Clinical Placement Coordinator for graduate students?

The role appears in the 2022-23 FNP Clinical Guidelines, the newest graduate handbook that can be read, but no current public NAU page names it, and titles may have changed since. Ask graduate nursing advising or your course faculty who receives Green Forms today, and follow the submission details on the form in your current course.

Who has the final say on my clinical placement?

The FNP Program Coordinator. The 2022-23 guidelines give that role the final placement decision and have it approve every preceptor and mentor. The Clinical Placement Coordinator gathers and pursues the request, but the approval comes from the program side. PMHNP students should ask which coordinator holds that authority for their track.

Can my course faculty find me a preceptor?

Their published role is different. Course faculty oversee your clinical learning indirectly and serve as NAU's link with the agency once you are placed. Placement requests travel on the Green Form to the Clinical Placement Coordinator. Faculty can still be a good source of leads, since they know what the course needs, but the request itself follows the form.

Is the Clinical Placement Coordinator the same as my advisor?

No. Advisors handle admissions, coursework and progression, and NAU's advising page treats graduate advising as its own service. The Clinical Placement Coordinator appears in the clinical guidelines as the person who receives Green Forms and secures or confirms sites. You may deal with both in the same term, for different reasons.

Who approves a change of preceptor partway through a practicum?

NAU has not published a procedure for a preceptor who withdraws. The guidelines do say that every preceptor needs the FNP Program Coordinator's approval, and the Green Form is how a new preceptor enters the system, so expect a replacement to follow the same route. Tell course faculty and the Clinical Placement Coordinator as soon as it happens, and see preceptor dropped out.

FormThe Green FormWhat NAU's FNP Preceptor/Agency Green Form asks, its two boxes, where to find it, who files it, and the term cutoffs on both versions of the form.ProcessClinical placement processHow a Northern Arizona University NP clinical gets approved: the preceptor, the Green Form, the site agreement, documents two months out, then the start notice.RulesPreceptor requirementsWho can precept a Northern Arizona University NP student: Arizona rule R4-19-502 as NAU applies it, from license and experience to focus and certification.SystemsNAU student systemsLOUIE, the location check each term, Canvas, NAU Gmail's move to Outlook, NAUgo, Cline Library and advising: the NAU systems that touch clinical planning.ProgressionProgression rulesWhat keeps you on track in NAU's graduate nursing programs: the 84% passing line, repeating a C, dismissal triggers, time limits and gaps in enrollment.State rulesState authorization and movingHow NAU's NC-SARA membership covers practicum hours in another state, the location check at each login, the Change of Location form and steps before a move.

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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