Colorado: UCCS's home state, from the campus BSN to online NP clinicals
Every UCCS nursing program is open to Colorado residents, including the campus BSN that only people living in or moving to Colorado can join. On the online NP tracks you still line up your own preceptor where you live, and Colorado's compact license, APRN rules and rural preceptor tax credit all shape that search.
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Every UCCS nursing program, from a Colorado address
Colorado is the only state on all three of UCCS's residency lists: the 14-state list behind the graduate NP programs, the 21-state list behind the online RN to BSN, and the campus BSN, open to people already living in Colorado or planning to move here. For UCCS, residency means where you physically live, so your actual home is what counts. The approved states page sets the lists side by side.
| Program | Open to Colorado residents? | Where the clinical hours happen |
|---|---|---|
| MSN: FNP, AGNP or PMHNP (online) | Yes | Colorado primary care or psychiatric sites near your home, with a preceptor you line up |
| RN to MSN | Yes | No clinicals in the NURS 4460 bridge, then Colorado NP rotations |
| Post-Graduate NP Certificate | Yes | Colorado sites set up where you reside, following your GAP analysis |
| BSN to DNP | Yes, with an RN license from an approved state | NP rotations in Colorado, then a DNP project site and institutional mentor |
| Post-Master's DNP | Yes, with an RN license from an approved state | 540 DNP experience hours tied to your project |
| RN to BSN | Yes | NURS 4450 at a Colorado community site you secure, approved by faculty |
| Traditional or Accelerated BSN (campus) | Yes, for Colorado residents and people moving here | Colorado facilities UCCS assigns |
Everything in the right-hand column except the campus BSN rests on your own search: UCCS's MSN page places the job of finding primary care hours with the student, in the community where that student lives. The college's part comes next, reviewing the site, preparing the Affiliation Agreement and the preceptor's letter, and overseeing the rotation.
Licensing and APRN practice in Colorado
The Colorado State Board of Nursing licenses RNs and APRNs from inside DORA's Division of Professions and Occupations in Denver. HB20-1216 continued the Nurse Practice Act until September 1, 2027, and the Board says a sunset review of its work is under way, so the 2027 legislative session is worth watching.
Colorado has been in the Nurse Licensure Compact since January 19, 2018. A multistate RN license covers your Colorado hours, and it is also the license UCCS asks for if the Graduate Clinical Practicum Coordinator approves hours in another compact state on the college's list.
AANP counts Colorado among the full practice states. Board rule fills in the detail: a new APRN prescribes under provisional authority and has three years to log 750 mentored hours alongside a fully authorized physician or APRN. That matters for your search, since UCCS looks for NP preceptors whose prescriptive authority is already full and who have practiced for at least two years. Colorado NP practice and preceptors covers the rule, the mentorship and the APRN Compact, which Colorado has not enacted.
Colorado residents also skip a question students elsewhere must ask. UCCS is itself a Colorado school, and the Board's program-approval rule targets pre-licensure education, so no out-of-state approval step stands between you and a Colorado site.
Where Colorado's NPs practice
Most Coloradans live along the Front Range. The Denver-Aurora-Centennial metro counted about 3.09 million people in the 2025 Census estimates and Colorado Springs about 782,000, with Greeley and Fort Collins-Loveland near 378,000 and 377,000. Pueblo, Cañon City, the Western Slope and the mountain and rural counties complete the map.
The large systems are familiar names: UCHealth, whose southern region includes Memorial, Memorial North, Grandview and Pikes Peak Regional; CommonSpirit Health, with Penrose and St. Francis in Colorado Springs, St. Mary-Corwin in Pueblo and the St. Anthony hospitals; Intermountain Health, with Saint Joseph, Good Samaritan and Lutheran; HCA HealthONE; Banner Health in Northern Colorado; AdventHealth; Children's Hospital Colorado; Kaiser Permanente Colorado; and Denver Health.
None of the student pages reviewed for this guide mentions UCCS. Read these systems as examples of where Colorado preceptors practice, not as sites arranged for UCCS students. Preceptors also work in independent practices, community health centers and rural clinics, and every site, large or small, goes through UCCS's own agreement process.
How Colorado systems take NP students
Each system runs its own intake. A few patterns from the systems' own pages, and from UCCS's handbook, are worth knowing before you start calling:
- UCHealth Memorial in Colorado Springs runs every student request through My Clinical Exchange, wants your school's coordinator involved from the first contact, and asks for at least eight weeks' notice, while making clear that a request is not an acceptance.
- The University of Colorado Hospital's Office of Advanced Practice in Aurora has paused new student placement requests and describes the pause as temporary.
- CommonSpirit's Colorado student placement page covers St. Mary-Corwin and St. Thomas More; no NP process for Penrose-St. Francis turned up.
- Denver Health, according to UCCS's own practicum handbook, may limit its clinics to students from select universities, employees included.
- A 2023-24 statewide flu document shows Banner Health, CommonSpirit, HCA HealthONE and UCHealth North collecting student compliance items in My Clinical Exchange.
For FNP and AGNP students that points toward the systems' outpatient primary care clinics, because UCCS excludes hospital and inpatient hours on those tracks; psychiatric units and outpatient mental health clinics both suit the PMHNP track. When a site requires My Clinical Exchange, UCCS submits the rotation request and you register and pay for the account. Our local guides go further: Colorado Springs, Denver and the Front Range and the rest of Colorado.
Rural Colorado, the preceptor tax credit and workforce programs
The Colorado Center for Nursing Excellence describes a shortage of providers in rural communities that leaves them without full access to primary care. The legislature has answered with money for rural nursing and a tax credit for rural preceptors.
The Rural and Frontier Health Care Preceptor Tax Credit, first created by HB16-1142, rewards clinicians who teach students in rural and frontier parts of Colorado. A 2022 law, HB22-1005, kept it running into the early 2030s and opened it to registered nurses and several behavioral health professions as well as physicians and advanced practice nurses. The student has to be enrolled at an accredited Colorado institution, a test UCCS meets, and the college's Preceptor Information page links to the credit as a state program. Preceptors confirm current terms and claim steps with the Colorado Department of Revenue.
UCCS also offers a Rural Health Workforce Initiative scholarship, paid from legislative funds and aimed at its RN to BSN and graduate nursing students; recipients agree to practice for two years in a rural or frontier Colorado county. The Colorado Center for Nursing Excellence adds Preceptor 101 and 201 trainings in early 2027, a Primary Care NP Fellowship for RNs in rural and underserved areas (applications closed March 1, 2026) and a Rural NP Behavioral Health Fellowship with a psychiatric focus.
Living near campus: what Colorado residents can use
The Johnson Beth-El College sits on the UCCS campus on Austin Bluffs Parkway in Colorado Springs. It is home to the Simulation Learning Center, which holds accreditation from the Society for Simulation in Healthcare in teaching and education, and to the Lane Center for Academic Health Sciences, whose Health Circle Clinics include a Primary Care Clinic.
The online MSN requires no campus visits, but living in Colorado can make the optional campus time easier. In NURS 6980 Synthesis, FNP and AGNP students can add as many as 20 hours earned at on-campus simulation or skills lab sessions; anyone unable to make the trip can ask the Option Coordinator what else is possible.
The Traditional and Accelerated BSN are taught in person in Colorado, and UCCS assigns their clinical placements, so the find-your-own model applies to the online programs only. The Traditional BSN page explains the campus route. In the RN to BSN, NURS 4450 takes place at a community site the student picks and faculty sign off on, and course faculty hold a small number of Colorado Springs sites.
Why Colorado UCCS students choose us
We are built around UCCS's process and Colorado's clinical map. We search where you live, from Colorado Springs and the Denver metro to Pueblo, Grand Junction and the mountain towns, for a preceptor who meets UCCS's standards: the right license and credentials, full prescriptive authority for NPs, two years in practice and a setting that fits your course.
Then we assemble your Clinical Site Sheet details, from the preceptor's credentials, license and certification to the site's signing authority and an exact hour count, so the sheet lands with the Academic Services Professional early and the Affiliation Agreement can get going. We point out mCE sites before they surprise you, and if a preceptor drops, we are already searching for the next one. The college makes the approval decision; our job is to hand it a file that is accurate and rule-ready from the start. Tell us your course and your town.
Questions UCCS students ask
Does it matter where in Colorado I live for UCCS's online NP tracks?
No. The whole state sits on the 14-state list that governs the MSN, RN to MSN and post-graduate certificate, and UCCS judges residency by where you physically live. Your clinical hours happen near home, whether that is Colorado Springs, the Denver metro, the Western Slope or a rural county, with a preceptor and site you find and UCCS approves.
Which Colorado health systems already have agreements with UCCS?
UCCS does not share that list. Its practicum handbook says lists of sites with clinical education agreements cannot be given to students, and points you to the Clinical Practicum Coordinator for help. None of the Colorado system student pages reviewed for this guide mentions UCCS. Treat every system as a place where preceptors work, and let UCCS's agreement process confirm the site.
Can UCCS FNP students do hours at a Colorado hospital?
Not in the hospital itself. UCCS limits FNP and AGNP hours to primary care and bars hospital, inpatient and emergency department hours, so outpatient primary care clinics are where those tracks train. PMHNP students are different: UCCS encourages both inpatient and outpatient psychiatric settings. If a setting seems borderline, get the Graduate Clinical Practicum Coordinator's view first.
Can my Colorado preceptor claim the rural preceptor tax credit?
Possibly, if your preceptor teaches you in a rural or frontier area of Colorado. The credit is meant for preceptors of students enrolled at an accredited Colorado institution, which UCCS is, and eligible preceptors include physicians, advanced practice nurses and registered nurses. The Colorado Department of Revenue holds the current terms, so your preceptor confirms eligibility there.
Is the UCCS campus BSN open to people moving to Colorado?
Yes. UCCS opens the Traditional and Accelerated BSN to current Colorado residents and to applicants who plan to move to the state. Both are taught in person, and UCCS assigns their clinical placements to Colorado facilities, so the find-your-own-preceptor model belongs to the online graduate programs rather than the campus BSN.
Related pages
Last checked 2026-09-25
We check these pages against UCCS's catalog, practicum handbooks and college pages. Your degree plan, the handbook for your cohort and the Graduate Clinical Practicum Coordinator have the final word.
UCCS asks you to find your clinical hours where you live. Let us run that search.
Tell us your UCCS track, your next clinical course and where you live. We find preceptors who fit the course and prepare the details your Clinical Site Sheet needs, early enough for the agreement to be signed before the semester.
- Preceptors matched to the course: pediatrics for
NURS 6900, acute and chronic care forNURS 6915andNURS 6925, psychiatric prescribers forNURS 6801toNURS 6803 - Credentials, license, certification and the site's signer ready for the Clinical Site Sheet
- In Colorado Springs, along the Front Range, or in any of UCCS's approved states
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