YSU FNP clinical hours: five practicums of 150 hours
Youngstown State University's online Family Nurse Practitioner program closes with five practicums of 2 credits each, NURS 7061 through NURS 7065, and YSU's FAQ puts each at 150 hours: 750 in total, the figure on the FNP program page. The 2026-27 catalog still says 600, a number that belongs to YSU's retired four-practicum design, and the FAQ adds a third figure of 180 hours per term. This page traces each number and shows what 150 hours in seven weeks asks of your calendar.
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The five FNP practicums and their hours
The 2026-27 catalog gives each practicum's title, credits and prerequisite, but none of its hours. The 150-hour figures come from YSU's online FAQ, which lists all five courses and totals them at 750. The focus column paraphrases the opening of each catalog description, and each course guide goes further.
| Course | Catalog focus | Credits | Hours (FAQ list) | Opens after |
|---|---|---|---|---|
NURS 7061 Practicum 1 | Begin managing common acute and chronic conditions | 2 | 150 | NURS 7047 with a B or better |
NURS 7062 Practicum 2 | Synthesize findings and form differential diagnoses | 2 | 150 | NURS 7061 with a B or better |
NURS 7063 Practicum 3 | Refine diagnostic reasoning and apply current evidence | 2 | 150 | NURS 7062 with a B or better |
NURS 7064 Practicum 4 | Clinical reasoning and leadership for patients across the lifespan | 2 | 150 | NURS 7063 with a B or better |
NURS 7065 Practicum 5 | Clinical mastery, autonomy and readiness for certification | 2 | 150 | NURS 7064 with a B or better |
| Total | 10 | 750 |
After the last practicum comes NURS 7005, whose 60 project clock hours sit outside this table; the Capstone guide covers when to take it.
Why YSU shows both 750 and 600
The FNP program page, last edited in August 2026, sets the supervised practicum at 750 hours across primary care settings, and the FAQ's course-by-course list agrees. The catalog's FNP page for 2026-27 still describes 600 hours. So do the post-master's FNP catalog and certificate pages, a block of hour recommendations in the same FAQ, an online MSN guide from October 2025 that spoke of four practicums of 150, and an FNP timeline article updated in June 2026.
The 600 matches YSU's earlier sequence. That design used four practicums: NURS 7048, NURS 7049 and NURS 7050 at a recommended 150 hours each, then NURS 7051 for at least 75 more plus whatever remained to reach 600. The 2022-23 handbook expected all 600 by the end of NURS 7051, and those courses still sit in the catalog's course list for students on older catalog years. The 2026-27 program requires five practicums, and five at 150 comes to 750.
Our reading, not a YSU statement: the catalog's 600 sentence was carried over from the old design, and 750 is the figure for students under the 2026-27 catalog. The current handbook states no total. Plan for 150 in each practicum and ask your clinical faculty or the Graduate Program Director to confirm the total tied to your catalog year.
Certificate students face the same question. The post-master's FNP certificate runs 37 credits, or 19 for nurse practitioners who already hold an MSN, and both versions include all five practicums while their pages print 600. The certificate page compares the two routes.
The FAQ's 180 hours per term
One FAQ answer says 180 practicum hours are to be completed in a 7-week term, averaging about 26 a week. That sits beside the same FAQ's list of 150 per practicum. Five terms at 180 would come to 900, a total no YSU page states (our arithmetic).
A likely origin: the October 2025 online MSN guide described YSU's older AGACNP design as three practicums of 180 hours, 540 in all, so the 180 may be a figure from that track that outlived it. That too is our inference. For your own course, the target that counts is the one in your practicum syllabus on Blackboard, as your clinical faculty apply it.
Plan each FNP practicum around 150 hours, check your syllabus for the number your course is graded on, and ask your clinical faculty to settle it in writing if the two differ.
What 150 hours in seven weeks asks of your week
Spread evenly, 150 hours over seven weeks is about 21.5 a week. Lose the first week to onboarding or a slow start and the remaining six need 25 a week. The table sets common clinic patterns against that target; every figure in it is our arithmetic, not YSU's.
| Pattern | Hours a week | Hours in 7 weeks | Reaches 150? |
|---|---|---|---|
| Two 8-hour days | 16 | 112 | No, 38 short |
| Two 10-hour days | 20 | 140 | No, 10 short |
| Two 11-hour days | 22 | 154 | Only if no day is missed |
| Three 8-hour days | 24 | 168 | Yes, early in week 7 |
| Three 9-hour days | 27 | 189 | Yes, during week 6 |
The FAQ's 180-hour figure needs about 26 a week, which, of the patterns above, only three 9-hour days cover. Check the term's holidays too: YSU's 2026-27 calendar marks Nov 11 and Nov 26 and 27 as holidays inside the Fall 2 term, and if your preceptor's office closes those days, the hours have to land elsewhere. The handbook has missed hours made up at a time your preceptor and clinical faculty approve.
Splitting hours across preceptors
YSU's FAQ lets you divide a practicum's hours among approved preceptors and sets no required number of them. That helps when one preceptor can offer only two clinic days a week, and it is one way to fit pediatric or women's health time into a term spent mainly with an adult primary care preceptor; the FNP hour mix shows the planning.
Physician assistants are the contested case. The 2026-27 handbook allows up to 150 FNP hours with an approved PA after you pass NURS 7061; the older FAQ says PAs may not precept. Every added preceptor also needs YSU's approval before you work with them, so a split means one more set of details inside the two-month window. The preceptor requirements guide sets out who qualifies.
How we keep five practicums of hours moving
Five 150-hour blocks mean five separate preceptor approvals, and YSU wants the details for each one two months before that term starts. We look for primary care preceptors whose clinic weeks can carry 150 hours in seven weeks, confirm the setting fits YSU's grid, and prepare what the preceptor request needs well before the deadline. While one practicum runs, the next preceptor is already being confirmed, and if a preceptor steps away partway through a term, the search for a replacement starts right away so the rest of that term's hours have somewhere to go.
Tell us your next practicum and where you live through the form below, or read the seven-week term guide to see how the deadlines stack up across the five terms.
Questions YSU students ask
What if I have not finished 150 hours when the 7-week term ends?
Talk to your clinical faculty before the term closes. YSU's catalog allows an Incomplete only when most of the course (over 60 percent) is complete and the reason is beyond your control, and the handbook blocks the next course until an Incomplete is cleared. The 2022-23 handbook's extra seven weeks for unfinished FNP hours is gone from the 2026-27 edition. See behind on clinical hours.
Do hours with a physician count the same as hours with a nurse practitioner?
Yes. The 2026-27 handbook lists licensed physicians (MD or DO) among approved preceptors alongside nationally certified APRNs, and the FAQ names MD, DO and NP preceptors for FNP students. What matters for the hours is a primary care setting and a preceptor approved before your first day.
Can extra hours in one practicum carry over to the next?
YSU publishes no carry-over rule either way. Each practicum is a separate course with its own grade from clinical faculty, so ask them before logging far past a course's target in the hope of banking time for the next term, and keep every hour documented in Exxat as the handbook requires.
Do part-time FNP students complete fewer hours per practicum?
Nothing in YSU's sources says so. The FAQ lists 150 hours per course, and the handbook limits every specialty student to one specialty course per term, so part-time status changes how the core courses are spread, not the practicum load. The handbook puts the FNP at about 22 months full time or 36 part time.
Related pages
Last checked 2026-09-26
We check these pages against YSU's own catalog, graduate handbook, online program pages and FAQ, and Ohio rules. Your clinical faculty, the Graduate Clinical Coordinator and your advisor have the final word.
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