Drexel NP clinicals in Tennessee

Tennessee does appear on Drexel's State Regulations page, but only beside a counseling degree. Every nursing program takes Tennessee residents.

Two neighbors are closed to Drexel NP and DNP enrollment: Alabama to the south, which also excludes the RN-to-BSN, and Missouri across the Mississippi River.

The bill, SB 2013 in the Senate and HB 1905 in the House, creates sections 63-7-501 to 63-7-506 of the Tennessee Code. It tells the Board of Nursing to freeze, for two years, any application from a nursing school headquartered in another state that wants the Board's blessing to operate, recruit Tennesseans or place students in clinical settings here. Prelicensure, RN-to-BSN and APRN programs are treated alike.

Schools already approved when the law takes effect stay approved, though they must hand the Board and the state's Center for Nursing Advancement any data either one requests, down to preceptor lists and placement figures. The Center has until June 30, 2027 to propose fresh standards for outside programs that rely on Tennessee clinicians or sites. The law takes effect once enacted; one secondary source gives April 27, 2026, but official confirmation is missing, and no existing Board rule was found that already requires such approval.

• Does Drexel read the new law as covering its NP placements in Tennessee, and if so, is its approval already in place?
• If the Board or the Center requests data on Tennessee placements, does anything change for students already training here?
• What happens once the Center's recommended standards arrive after June 30, 2027, the same season Drexel moves to semesters?

Send these to Drexel's state authorization office at sara@drexel.edu and copy your track director. How Drexel handles state rules in general is on Drexel's state authorization page.

AANP counts Tennessee as restricted. NPs here practice with physician supervision, and their Schedule II to IV prescribing and opioid quantities are capped. Either the NP or the supervising physician can precept you once Drexel approves them; Drexel wants board certification, a Tennessee license and a year or more of practice, and it takes nurse midwives as well.

Tennessee has belonged to the compact since January 2018. Clinical Compliance lets a Tennessee multistate license stand in for Pennsylvania's; the program pages disagree, and the license page shows both versions.

The Tennessee Hospital Association's Nurse Preceptor Incentive Program, paid for by a state grant, rewards preceptors for each cycle of 70 or more hours of one-on-one teaching until funds run out. APRNs qualify with a clean Tennessee or compact license, US citizen or permanent resident status, and the UTHSC preceptor course, which has an NP module.

Student eligibility is tighter. Hours count for students of accredited Tennessee programs and for students of schools in seven neighbors (Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Kentucky, Mississippi, Missouri and Virginia) who train in Tennessee. Pennsylvania isn't among them, so a Drexel rotation doesn't appear to qualify; a preceptor wanting certainty can ask THA. The current cycle closes December 1, 2026, with paperwork due December 10.

Nashville's metro is the largest, then Memphis, Knoxville and Chattanooga, which reaches into Georgia. Vanderbilt University Medical Center is the best-known academic system; Methodist Le Bonheur Healthcare, Covenant Health, Erlanger and Ballad Health are other large employers. Each site signs its own agreement through Drexel's contracting process.

We keep the Tennessee search and the Tennessee question moving together. While you get Drexel's answer on the new law, we line up NPs, CNMs and physicians in your metro who fit your course, with fallbacks in Kentucky, Georgia or another open neighbor. Every lead is vetted against Drexel's rules and packaged for Clinical Compliance, so Drexel's approval step starts from a complete file. Request a Tennessee search.