Nursing Associate Degree Online

When my friend said she enrolled for a nursing associate degree online, I had so many questions! After all, this type of degree needs practice; so, how can you do a nursing associate degree online?

When I asked her how the nursing associate degree online works, she told me that once you start the nursing associate degree program, you generally complete the non-clinical portion of your course work through the online classes. However, the clinicals are usually arranged at a hospital near your home; as I well knew, there are no schools that will allow one to fulfill clinical requirements online!

Of course, my curiosity did not stop there

I wanted to know more about her fabulous and exciting nursing associate degree online. So I asked her how the classes work in the nursing associate degree online program.

She explained that the this varies from school to school, but now a days there are so many facilities that conduct online classes and have entire programs (like the one my friend got into) online. Usually, the nursing associate degree online program has its own site where the instructor posts the lecture materials and assignments for the students to retrieve.

There is also a forum or bulletin board where discussions are held regularly and where anyone can post/leave a comment if they wish to do so. Sometimes there will be an assigned time to log in the forum for all students in order to discuss certain aspects of the degree.

Many online classes following this sort of program, have replaced the traditional exam with that of written course work, so more emphasis is placed on assignments rather then exams. Don’t get me wrong, some exams may still be offered online or they may be proctored; often universities provide students with a designated place near them where they can go and physically take the exam for their degree.

Now I wanted to know from my friend if this nursing associate degree online program was letting her study at her own pace, since it was online. She explained that while some online programs do that, her particular program wanted her to keep up with the same quarter and semester schedule as on-campus students.

Her nursing associate degree online program was structured around fixed assignments and exams much like a traditional on campus course. A nursing associate degree online program takes the traditional time of six to eight weeks, this is one degree you cannot or they will not let you accelerate.