Southeastern's BSN to DNP, FNP concentration: clinicals and residency, semester by semester
Southeastern Louisiana University runs the BSN to DNP with a Family Nurse Practitioner concentration together with the University of Louisiana at Lafayette: 70 credits, nine semesters in the catalog plan, 750 precepted FNP hours and then three residency courses built around your DNP project. You choose the preceptors and facilities, and course faculty approve them. We find Louisiana preceptors for each of those courses early, so approval and the facility contract have time to settle before every semester opens.
Plan your FNP and residency placements
Tell us your start term and where in Louisiana you live, and your placement advisor will map a preceptor search to each course.
The program in numbers
Southeastern shares its doctorate with UL Lafayette, and the 2026-27 catalog sets the FNP concentration at 70 credit hours. Coursework is delivered at a distance, yet the catalog still asks you onto campus twice: for activities right before the program begins and again at the end, when you present your project. Southeastern's DNP page calls them orientation and the project defense.
New FNP doctoral students can enter in any of the three terms, per the catalog, with application deadlines of April 15 (summer), July 15 (fall) and November 15 (spring) on the DNP admissions page. Admission asks for an unencumbered Louisiana RN license, a 2.7 undergraduate GPA and a telephone interview with the DNP program coordinator. The catalog also sets an experience floor: twelve months of RN work in a field matching the specialty before your first clinical course.
One figure conflicts. Southeastern's majors page for this concentration shows 39 semester hours, while the catalog says 70, and only the catalog's number matches the course list below.
The nine-semester plan
The catalog's sample plan opens in a summer and closes in a spring. Statistics, theory and the advanced practice core fill the first year, the three Family Health courses then run back to back, and the residency sequence closes out the final three terms.
| Semester | Courses | Precepted hours |
|---|---|---|
| 1, summer | NURS 6050 | None |
| 2, fall | NURS 8010, NURS 8300, NURS 6180 | None |
| 3, spring | NURS 6070, NURS 6170, NURS 6020 | Weekly lab in NURS 6070 |
| 4, summer | NURS 6820 Family Health I | 200 |
| 5, fall | NURS 6830 Family Health II, NURS 8040, NURS 8310 | 275 |
| 6, spring | NURS 6840 Family Health III, NURS 6810, NURS 8030 | 275, plus 90 in NURS 8030 |
| 7, summer | NURS 8210 Residency I, NURS 8080 | 90 |
| 8, fall | NURS 8220 Residency II, NURS 8070 | 180 |
| 9, spring | NURS 8230 Residency III, NURS 8060 | 180 |
Two details shape the placement work. There is no break between Family Health I, II and III, so the search for your next preceptor overlaps the hours you are logging in the current course. And the plan marks semester six as a point where you may finish with an MSN, which matters if work or family changes mid-program. Hour totals, and the 600 hours printed on the majors page, are covered in the FNP clinical hours guide.
Family Health I lands in summer
NURS 6820 asks for 200 practicum hours with children and child-bearing women, and in this plan it falls in the summer semester. The registrar's summer 2026 semester ran June 3 to August 3; summer 2027 dates had not appeared on the calendar when this guide was written. Our arithmetic: 200 hours across roughly nine weeks is about 22 hours a week, on top of your nursing job.
Pediatric and women's health settings are also the tightest around Hammond. North Oaks' student clinical request page (archived May 2026 copy) says it has no pediatric rotations at this time. Ochsner Health's clinical education page accepts graduate nursing requests only from a school representative through InPlace Network, posts March 15 as its summer request deadline and asks students not to approach its providers directly. Pediatric and family practices, federally qualified health centers and school-based clinics are the other places worth checking.
Begin the Family Health I search in the fall or winter before that summer. The Family Health I guide covers the course itself.
Choosing preceptors, with faculty at each step
Southeastern's DNP page is plain that students choose their preceptors and facilities. The FNP clinical courses are the same ones the consortium MSN uses, so the consortium handbook's steps apply as well: you settle on a practice area that fits the course, propose a preceptor to the faculty member assigned to it, confirm that person agrees, and log nothing until course faculty sign off and the graduate coordinator has reviewed the choice. Choosing your preceptor sets out Southeastern's exact wording.
Faculty take part throughout. The consortium mentions a roster of preceptors, past and present, around south Louisiana that it can suggest, and its faculty handbook tells instructors to help students spot likely candidates.
The facility needs its own paperwork. Each clinical agency must have a university-level contract or agreement, apart from the three-way letter you, your preceptor and your faculty sign, and setting up a fresh one is a matter of weeks or months. Clinical contracts explains how to check before you commit to a site.
Louisiana, your license and your job
Southeastern's DNP pages carry no Louisiana-only sentence, but the FNP courses stay in the state in practice. They are the courses the MSN page requires to be completed in Louisiana, this concentration's catalog entry requires a Louisiana RN license, and the Louisiana State Board of Nursing expects each preceptor to be licensed in Louisiana as an RN, an APRN or both. The board also wants most of your hours with an APRN certified in your population, so family nurse practitioners anchor the search and physicians can cover a share. Louisiana-only clinicals covers students near the state line.
Your own employer can host clinicals, but only on time that is separate from your job and unpaid. Hours logged while you are on the clock never count, so plan clinical days around your schedule rather than inside it. Clinicals where you work walks through doing this well.
The residency and the 1,000-hour mark
NURS 8210, NURS 8220 and NURS 8230 carry 90, 180 and 180 residency hours by their course descriptions, 450 in all, while the catalog prints 540 for this concentration. One explanation, which is ours: the Project Planning course, NURS 8030, carries 90 practicum hours in its description, and 450 plus 90 equals 540. Ask your DNP faculty which count your plan follows.
The DNP aims at 1,000 hours after the BSN, a goal written into the description of NURS 8090 Advanced Directed Studies, which adds 135 residency hours per enrollment for students who need more. By our arithmetic, 750 FNP hours plus 450 residency hours already clear that mark.
Core courses count at either partner school, but residency time and NURS 8090 stay with your home school. Southeastern's 2018-19 DNP handbook, which no newer edition has replaced online, asks you to recruit a project mentor who works outside the university, with faculty weighing in, and to submit a facility agreement request for the project site even if you think one is already on file. IRB approval is expected during Residency I. The full picture is in DNP residency hours.
How we help Southeastern FNP doctoral students
Every search we run is built around Southeastern's plan and Southeastern's approval process, course by course.
- Map the calendarWe line up each Family Health course and each residency semester with the term it falls in, so every search starts a full semester ahead.
- Find the right Louisiana preceptorFor each course we look for a Louisiana-licensed FNP, or a physician for part of the hours, who sees the population the course names: children and child-bearing women, then adults, then adults and older adults.
- Check the siteWe confirm the practice will take a Southeastern student, ask whether it already holds an agreement with the university, and tell you what to look for in the clinical tracking system.
- Hand faculty a complete fileYou receive the preceptor's current CV, license details and the schedule facts the letter of agreement asks for, ready for your faculty conversation.
- Stay on callIf a preceptor steps away mid-semester, your placement advisor starts the replacement search the same week.
Want all three Family Health placements settled before Family Health I begins? Send us your admission term through the request form; the summer Family Health I search comes first.
Questions Southeastern students ask
Can I finish Southeastern's BSN to DNP FNP with an MSN instead?
Yes, the catalog permits an MSN exit for the two NP concentrations, and the FNP plan flags it after semester six, once Family Health III is complete. Speak with the graduate coordinator before you switch. According to Southeastern's DNP page, an MSN in the FNP concentration meets the educational requirements for either the ANCC or the AANP family certification exam.
Which background check company does the Southeastern DNP use?
Southeastern's live DNP admission requirements name Certified Background, with the student covering the cost. The older 2018-19 handbook pointed to Castle Branch for compliance and to Typhon for residency hour logs. Southeastern does not say whether those older names still apply, so follow the onboarding instructions you receive after admission and confirm the vendor there.
How often does a Southeastern DNP student have to be in Hammond?
Plan on two trips: orientation just before your first semester and your project defense in the final one. The 2018-19 handbook holds that defense, a slide presentation, in the School of Nursing building in Hammond. Students in north or west Louisiana should budget both journeys early.
Can a physician precept my FNP clinical hours?
For some of them. Louisiana's definition of a graduate preceptor includes physicians alongside APRNs, yet the board wants the larger share of an NP student's clinical time spent with an APRN certified in the same population. For you, that means family nurse practitioners carry most hours, and course faculty settle the final mix.
Is Southeastern's DNP program accredited?
Yes. CCNE, the Commission on Collegiate Nursing Education, shows Southeastern's DNP accredited until December 31, 2033, and expects its next campus visit in spring 2033. Southeastern's master's program and its post-graduate APRN certificate share that end date.
Related pages
Last checked 2026-09-27
We check these pages against Southeastern's own catalog, program pages and consortium handbook, and Louisiana rules. Your course faculty, the graduate coordinator and your advisor have the final word.
Southeastern asks you to choose your preceptor. We find one near you.
Tell us your Southeastern track, where in Louisiana you live and when your next clinical course starts. We find Louisiana-licensed preceptors who fit the course, confirm whether the facility is already under contract with the university, and hand you what your course faculty need to approve it before the semester.
- Pediatric and women's health preceptors for
NURS 6820, adult and older-adult primary care forNURS 6830andNURS 6840 - Psychiatric preceptors for
NURS 6910toNURS 6930, with the child and older-adult focus each course sets - Across Louisiana, from the Northshore to Shreveport
Start your placement plan
Program, city and start date is all we need to begin.