Doing your NAU practicum where you already work
Yes, a Northern Arizona University NP student can train at their own employer, but the site is treated like any other: it needs an affiliation agreement with NAU even though you work there, a preceptor who meets Arizona's rule, a Green Form and the FNP Program Coordinator's approval. NAU's DNP rules go further, keeping workplace hours outside your normal shifts and away from your own reporting line.
Get your placement plan
Tell us your NAU program and where you live. A placement advisor replies with the preceptor and site options that fit your course.
Same paperwork as any other site
NAU offers no shortcut for employers. The 2022-23 FNP Clinical Guidelines and the DNP handbook both say: "An agreement needs to be in place even if the student is employed in the facility." The rest of the route is unchanged as well: you submit the Green Form, the preceptor sends a CV or resume, license and certification, the FNP Program Coordinator approves, and you wait to be told you may start.
What changes is who you know. At your own workplace you can usually reach the practice manager or education office yourself, find out who signs school contracts, and learn whether NAU students have trained there before. That can turn the slowest step, the agreement, into a quick one. Our affiliation agreements guide explains the contract and its timeline.
Large systems publish student routes that begin with the school's coordinator, so ask your system's student-placement office whether staff follow the same route; the Arizona health systems guide summarizes each system's published process.
Keeping student hours apart from paid shifts
Practicum hours are hours as a student, under an approved preceptor, after NAU clears you to begin. The DNP handbook is explicit for workplace practicums: those hours must be "completed outside their normal working hours." The FNP guidelines carry no matching sentence, so ask your FNP Program Coordinator how NAU treats it for your track; keeping the two apart on your calendar and in your logs keeps the question simple.
Scheduling takes care because FNP rules limit when clinical can happen. The guidelines bar clinical during university breaks, holidays or weekends without prior approval from the FNP Program Coordinator. A nurse who works weekdays and hoped to do clinical days on Saturdays should raise it with that coordinator before building a plan around weekends. At 300 hours in NUR 663 or NUR 665, the weekly math matters, and our pacing guide works through it.
Who can supervise you at your own job
Your preceptor at work has to meet the same Arizona qualifications as anyone else: a current unencumbered license where they practice, a year as a physician or APRN, patients comparable to your program's focus and, for a nurse, certification. A charge nurse or RN manager, however experienced, does not meet the APRN-or-physician test.
The DNP handbook adds a reporting-line rule for workplace hours: the preceptor or mentor may not be "1) their immediate supervisor; and 2) someone who reports to them." The FNP guidelines are silent on that point, so an FNP student hoping to be precepted by their own boss, or by an NP they supervise, should ask the FNP Program Coordinator first. Our page on who cannot precept you sets out every published limit.
A colleague in a different clinic or department, with no reporting tie in either direction, is usually the cleaner choice.
Does your employer fit your track?
A workplace helps only if its patients match your practicum. FNP students need family primary care, and the guidelines' recommended split reserves time for children and for women's health alongside adult care. Hospital units where many RNs work are built around acute care, so the better fit is often an outpatient primary care clinic inside the same organization.
On the PMHNP track the site must be psychiatric, and the catalog attaches an in-person requirement to NUR 680. A behavioral health clinic or unit at your employer can be a strong candidate if an eligible psychiatric nurse practitioner or psychiatrist will precept you, subject to your program coordinator's view, since NAU has published no PMHNP-specific preceptor rules.
The recommended FNP hour mix shows how a workplace can cover one part of the spread while other sites cover the rest.
What your employer will ask for as a host
Even for its own staff, a clinical site acts as a host to a student. The guidelines expect background checks and drug testing "as required by agency," and students sign a release letting NAU share background, drug-screen, insurance and immunization records with clinical facilities. NAU's own documents still have to be on file two months before the rotation, whatever your employer already holds.
Liability is split as well. The 2022-23 guidelines describe State of Arizona coverage for students and also require FNP students to carry a personal professional liability policy. Your coverage as an employee is a separate matter, so ask your employer's education or risk office how it treats a staff member who is training as a student.
Weighing a workplace practicum
The case for it is strong. There is no travel, the site is familiar, the people who sign are within reach, and the agreement step is often faster. For students in rural Arizona, where the next clinic may be hours away, it can decide whether you sleep at home or in a motel during a practicum.
The case against is real too. Colleagues may pull you back into your RN role, the patient mix may cover only part of what three FNP practicums require, and relying on one site leaves you exposed if a preceptor leaves. One balanced plan uses the workplace for one practicum and outside sites for the others. Our placement options comparison sets the workplace route beside the other routes NAU students use.
How we help working nurses use, or add to, their workplace
Our placement desk starts by testing your employer as a site: whether an eligible preceptor with a comparable focus is available, whether the reporting lines are clean, and whether a new affiliation agreement will be needed. If it fits, we help you assemble the preceptor's CV, license and certification and the administrative contact, so the Green Form goes in with the site's approval and ahead of the cutoff.
Where your workplace covers only part of your hours, we find the remainder near home: the child and women's health visits an FNP plan calls for, or psychiatric time for the PMHNP track, with all three FNP practicums mapped together. If a preceptor leaves mid-term, a replacement search begins right away. Share your employer and track on the contact form.
Questions NAU students ask
Can I count hours from my regular job toward NAU clinical hours?
Plan on no. Practicum hours are logged as a student under an NAU-approved preceptor once you are cleared to start. The DNP handbook requires workplace hours to fall outside normal working hours, and the FNP guidelines tie hours to approved preceptors and the practicum courses. Ask your FNP Program Coordinator if your role raises a question.
Will my employer's onboarding satisfy NAU's clinical documents?
Not by itself. NAU keeps its own list: the 2022-23 guidelines require an RN license for the state of clinical practice, American Heart Association BLS, immunizations, TB screening, the Arizona DPS fingerprint clearance card and a personal liability policy, all on file two months before rotations. Your employer may hold some of the same papers, but each organization tracks its own requirements.
Can an NP I supervise be my preceptor?
Under the DNP handbook, no: for workplace hours the mentor may not be someone who reports to the student. The FNP guidelines do not address it, but a preceptor who reports to you would be evaluating their own manager, which is the kind of conflict the DNP rule targets. Ask the FNP Program Coordinator before proposing it.
Is a workplace practicum faster to set up?
Often, because you can reach the people who sign. Knowing the practice manager or education office lets you confirm the administrative contact and whether NAU students have trained there before, which can shorten the agreement step. The site still faces the same Green Form cutoffs, credential review and approval as any other.
Can I do all three FNP practicums at my workplace?
The question turns on patient mix. NAU's guidelines recommend a spread of pediatric, adult, women's health and specialty hours, plus minimum counts of visits such as pelvic and prostate exams. Few single workplaces cover that whole range, so check your patient population against the recommendations and ask the FNP Program Coordinator whether your plan works.
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
Start your placement plan
Track, town and next practicum is all we need to begin.