subject: Online LPN Degree: Truth Or Scam? [print this page] Online LPN Degree: Truth Or Scam? Online LPN Degree: Truth Or Scam?
The demand for nursing training and education have become so high that nursing school programs have had to limit the number of students they accept.
As a result, these days, aspiring students are looking into an online LPN degree to get to the top of these nursing school waiting lists.
Well, there's good news and there's bad news for those folks.
The fact is, it just isn't possible to get your LPN degree solely online.
That is because during the Licensed Practical Nursing program, a lot of the learning is the hands on, practical stuff. LPNs interact with patients while being trained and observed by registered nurses known as proctors.
It is during the second year of learning that nurses learn the classes that they are able to take online. Those classes are more heavily focused on management and theory.
In fact, there are a lot of nursing skills that can only be learned by doing them, and practicing them on a real live person. The thought of a nurse who learned absolutely everything online, frankly, is a scary one. And it would be quite unsafe.
There are, however, numerous LPN to RN online programs, paramedic to RN online programs, and even respiratory therapist to RN online programs. They are offered by private, expensive degree colleges but they are also becoming increasingly popular at community college because of the nursing shortage and the desperate need for registered nurses.
So while it's a smart move for a wanna-be nurse to obtain a Licensed Practical Nursing degree first (licensed vocational nursing degree in some states), it's a program that isn't available entirely online.
However, the waiting lists for LPN schools are much shorter than those for traditional RN programs. And there are "career colleges" which, while more expensive than technical schools and vocational schools and community colleges, often have no waiting list at all. It is worth exploring those options, because one a student becomes a Licensed Practical Nurse, it is very simple to find a bridge program which will give them their degree as an RN.
Now don't forget, there's really no such thing as an "online LPN degree" or an "online LPN school". Anyone talking about these things is just doing some wishful thinking.
