Marian University offers a Doctor of Nursing Practice: Family Nurse Practitioner.
Program Tracks Overview
| Program | Est. Tuition | Est. Duration | Credit Hours |
|---|---|---|---|
| DNP | $57.2K | 3 years (8 semesters) | 71 |
Marian’s defining feature is geographic. The Leighton School of Nursing has determined that its DNP APRN curriculum meets licensure requirements in Indiana and no other state, and its own federal compliance notice treats every student as located in the enrollment state for the entire clinical sequence. Add hybrid delivery that mixes face-to-face, online, and blended courses on the Indianapolis campus, and this is a program built for nurses who live in central Indiana and intend to stay.
Quick Facts
| Feature | Details |
|---|---|
| Program Types | BSN-to-DNP, Family Nurse Practitioner track |
| Format | Hybrid. Courses delivered face-to-face, online, and blended on the Indianapolis campus. |
| Clinical Hours | Not clearly stated. Curriculum carries 14 clinical credits across four practicum courses. |
| Clinical Placement | Program administrators assist students in securing clinical sites and preceptors. |
| Population | Pediatric, adolescent, adult, women’s health, and geriatric primary care. |
| Distinctive Coursework | Clinical Differential Judgment & Diagnosis; Integrative Behavioral Health and Family Systems. |
| Simulation | Hill-Rom Simulation Center in the Evans Center for Health Sciences. |
| Licensure Determination | Indiana only. Marian has not determined APRN licensure adequacy for any other state. |
| Admissions Gate | Interview with the Admission Committee; graduate statistics course completed within the past five years. |
| RN License Requirements | Current, valid RN license required at application and throughout enrollment. |
| Tuition | $805 per credit hour, 2026-27. No flat full-time rate applies at DNP term loads. |
| Accreditation | CCNE (nursing); Higher Learning Commission (institutional). |
Doctor of Nursing Practice: Family Nurse Practitioner
The estimated tuition for the DNP FNP track at Marian University is approximately $57,155 (71 credits at $805/credit). The program can generally be completed in about 3 years, which Marian publishes as eight semesters of full-time study across a summer, fall, and spring cycle.
This is a BSN-entry doctorate with no master’s exit point and no post-master’s certificate alternative. The full official listing is the Doctor of Nursing Practice: Family Nurse Practitioner Track.
DNP Curriculum
The 71 credits divide into 57 didactic credits and 14 clinical credits. What distinguishes the sequence is how late the clinical work starts and how heavily it loads at the end.
Front-loaded science and scholarship. The first four terms, 36 credits in all, contain no clinical practicum at all. Students move through advanced physiology and pathophysiology, advanced health assessment, advanced pharmacology, epidemiology, nursing research, analytical methods for evidence translation, and information management before touching a patient in the FNP role. Two DNP project courses and a health policy course sit in the middle of the sequence rather than at the end.
Specialty spine. The clinical identity of the program is a four-course ladder: Primary Care Across the Lifespan I, II, and III, closing with Primary Care Immersion. Clinical credits climb 2, then 3, then 3, then 6. Two courses outside that ladder carry real weight. Clinical Differential Judgment & Diagnosis is a standalone three-credit course on diagnostic reasoning, which many FNP programs fold into an assessment course rather than teaching separately. Integrative Behavioral Health and Family Systems is a full three-credit course on mental health in primary care, an area where FNP graduates are routinely underprepared for what walks through a family practice door.
Terminal immersion. The final fall term is 8 credits, 7 of which belong to Primary Care Immersion and its 6 clinical credits. Marian describes this as a transition-to-practice experience. Structurally it functions as a near-full-time residency: 43% of the entire program’s clinical credit sits in the last term.
- NSG 503 Advanced Physiology and Pathophysiology (3)
- NSG 506 Advanced Health Assessment (3)
- NSG 504 Advanced Pharmacology (3)
- NSG 604 Clinical Differential Judgment & Diagnosis (3)
- NSG 608 Integrative Behavioral Health and Family Systems (3)
- NSG 672 / 674 / 676 Primary Care Across Lifespan I, II, III (5, 6, 6)
- NSG 682 Current Events in Primary Care (1)
- NSG 610 FNP Comprehensive (1)
- NSG 678 Primary Care Immersion (7)
- NSG 706 / 707 / 708 DNP Project 1, 2, 3 (1 each)
You Should Know
- Marian’s graduate nursing progression policy sets 83% as the passing threshold in all graduate nursing courses. A grade below that is a failure and triggers dismissal review; two such grades result in dismissal.
- Students may repeat only one graduate nursing course across the entire program, and may withdraw from a graduate nursing course only once.
- Didactic transfer credit is capped at 20% of track credits, roughly 14 credits. No NSG 600-level FNP course credit is accepted for transfer under any circumstance.
- Each student is issued an iPad at the start of the program, and accidental damage costs fall to the student.
DNP Clinical Requirements
- 14 clinical credits total, across four courses: NSG 672 (2), NSG 674 (3), NSG 676 (3), NSG 678 (6).
- Clinical work begins in the fifth term. The first four terms are entirely didactic.
- Program administrators assist students in securing clinical sites and preceptors rather than leaving placement entirely to the student.
- Skills practice takes place in the Hill-Rom Simulation Center inside the Evans Center for Health Sciences on campus.
- Annual criminal background check and urine drug screen are required, plus current American Heart Association BLS certification maintained through graduation.
- Total clinical contact hours: not clearly stated in Marian’s published materials.
Marian publishes clinical credits but not a clinical hour total, which is unusual for an FNP program and matters more than it sounds. National certification through AANP or ANCC requires a minimum of 500 faculty-supervised clinical hours, most FNP programs land in the 600 to 700 range, and AACN’s DNP standard calls for 1,000 post-baccalaureate practice hours. Depending on the hours-per-credit conversion Marian applies, 14 clinical credits could land anywhere across that entire span. Ask the program director for the conversion in writing before you accept a seat, because it determines both your certification eligibility and how many days a week you will be at a clinical site during the final immersion.
The placement support is a real advantage. Programs that require students to find their own preceptors regularly leave people scrambling, and the search is the most common reason FNP students fall behind schedule. Marian’s model shifts that burden onto administrators.
You Should Know
- Marian’s compliance notice states that students are considered located in their enrollment state throughout their clinical education because of required in-person clinical components. In practice this constrains relocating mid-program.
- Clinical absences must be made up before the end of the semester or the course grade converts to an incomplete.
- The published clinical hour conversion, preceptor credential requirements, and any faculty site-visit schedule are not stated in the public program materials.
DNP Admissions
Two features stand out: every applicant interviews with the Admission Committee, and a graduate-level statistics course completed within the past five years must be finished before matriculation, not before graduation.
- BSN from an ACEN or CCNE-accredited program
- Minimum 3.00 overall undergraduate GPA and a minimum 3.00 cumulative science GPA, both on a 4.00 scale
- Current, valid RN license
- 500-word personal statement
- Three recommendations addressing academic ability, work ethic, professional contributions, and graduate school potential
- Interview with the Admission Committee
- Prerequisite: three semester hours of graduate-level statistics, grade of B or better, from a CHEA and USDE-approved institution, taken within the past five years
- Official transcripts from every college or university attended
- Three annual entry points: spring, summer, and fall
Marian publishes no minimum RN experience requirement, which is less common than it used to be among doctoral FNP programs and opens the door to newer nurses. The dual GPA screen works in the other direction. Requiring a 3.00 in science coursework specifically, separate from the overall undergraduate GPA, filters out applicants who recovered a weak start in prerequisites with strong later grades.
If your statistics course is older than five years or was undergraduate-level, Marian offers BMS 511 Biostatistics in a five-week online format once per semester, taken as a non-degree graduate student. Budget for it as a real pre-program cost and a real scheduling constraint.
You Should Know
- Marian’s published application schedule labels all three intakes as part-time entry, while the program page and plan of study describe an eight-semester full-time sequence. Confirm which pacing your cohort is actually admitted under.
- The five-year recency window on the statistics prerequisite disqualifies many otherwise-eligible applicants. Verify your transcript date before applying.
- Marian states it has not determined whether the DNP APRN curriculum meets licensure or certification requirements for any state other than Indiana. Out-of-state applicants should contact the school’s director of accreditation before applying.
- The application fee is disclosed as a one-time charge with no amount published.
Tuition
Marian charges the DNP FNP track at $805 per credit hour for fall 2026 and spring 2027, published on the Business Office rate table as a distinct line from every other graduate rate at the university.
Two other rates on that same page look tempting and are wrong for this program. “Graduate Programs – General Coursework” and “Graduate Nursing (non-degree)” both sit at $590 per credit and apply to non-degree enrollment, not the DNP. The $13,800 per semester figure belongs to the CRNA track, not FNP. The $1,880 per credit part-time rate is undergraduate.
| Line Item | Figure |
|---|---|
| Published rate, 2026-27 | $805 per credit hour |
| Program credits | 71 |
| Derived program tuition | $57,155 |
| Derived Year 1 tuition (27 credits) | $21,735 |
| Prior-year rate (derived from published Year 1 cost of attendance) | $795 per credit hour |
The $57,155 total is derived, not published. Marian lists no program total anywhere. The prior-year rate is also derived: the 2025-26 cost-of-attendance table shows $21,465 in Year 1 tuition, and the plan of study places 27 credits in Year 1, which divides to exactly $795 per credit.
Confirmed costs
- $805 per credit hour for DNP FNP coursework, fall 2026 and spring 2027
- Application fee, charged once
- Background check and urine drug screen, arranged and paid by the student at matriculation and annually thereafter
- Personal health insurance, required and student-funded
Be aware that:
- Marian’s rate table is published one academic year at a time, and the rate rose $10 per credit between 2025-26 and 2026-27. A three-year program will span at least three rate revisions, so $57,155 is a floor rather than a forecast.
- No flat full-time rate applies. Term loads in the plan of study run 8 to 10 credits, below Marian’s published 12-credit full-time band, so every credit bills individually.
- The BMS 511 statistics prerequisite is billed separately as non-degree enrollment. Marian’s rate table lists graduate nursing non-degree coursework at $590 per credit and biomedical science non-degree coursework at $1,130 per credit, and the application instructions direct DNP applicants to a third enrollment category not shown on the table. Three credits therefore lands somewhere between roughly $1,770 and $3,390.
- The cost of attendance figure on the program page, $57,559 for Year 1, is a financial aid budget that bundles housing, transportation, personal expenses, and books. It is not tuition and should not be compared against other schools’ tuition totals.
- Additional course fees are referenced on the rate table without being enumerated for nursing courses. Ask the Business Office for a nursing-specific fee schedule.
Practically, a nurse should plan for roughly $57,000 to $60,000 in tuition alone, plus the statistics prerequisite, annual compliance screening, and health insurance. The absence of a published fee schedule for the DNP is the largest remaining unknown in the figure. Marian’s official Tuition Rates page is the authoritative source and is updated annually.
Why Choose This FNP Program?
Best suited for nurses who live and intend to practice in central Indiana, want a doctorate rather than a master’s, and value structured clinical placement over maximum scheduling freedom.
Placement support that actually removes work. Marian’s administrators assist in securing both clinical sites and preceptors. For a working RN, this is the single most valuable feature on this page. Nurses in self-placement programs routinely spend months cold-calling practices, and a failed search delays graduation by a full term. Marian’s hospital relationships in Indianapolis date to the program’s founding, when a local health system provided both financial backing and clinical training support.
A doctorate with clinical depth in the right places. Two full courses that many FNP programs compress or skip get standalone treatment here: diagnostic reasoning and behavioral health in family systems. The terminal immersion concentrates 6 clinical credits in one term, which is closer to how a residency works than to how most part-time FNP practicum sequences are paced. Graduates finish with a DNP rather than an MSN, which matters for faculty appointments, system leadership roles, and any employer that has quietly moved to doctoral preference.
The trade-off is mobility. This program is hybrid, not online. Coursework is delivered face-to-face, online, and in blended formats on the Indianapolis campus, and Marian has not published how often you need to be there. More consequentially, the school has determined licensure adequacy only for Indiana and treats you as located in your enrollment state throughout clinical education. If your five-year plan includes a move, a military relocation, or a spouse’s career change, that constraint is a genuine risk and should be resolved with the school in writing before you enroll.
Accreditation
The Doctor of Nursing Practice program at Marian University’s Leighton School of Nursing is accredited by the Commission on Collegiate Nursing Education. Marian’s accreditation statement names the baccalaureate and DNP programs specifically, which covers the FNP track on this page. Because Marian offers no MSN or post-graduate certificate in this specialty, the DNP scope statement is the only one a prospective FNP student needs to verify.
Marian University is institutionally accredited by the Higher Learning Commission. Institutional accreditation is what makes the university eligible to disburse federal financial aid and what allows other institutions to accept credits earned here, so it operates separately from and alongside the nursing accreditation.
The Leighton School of Nursing is approved by the Indiana State Board of Nurses’ Registration and Nursing Education. The DNP FNP track received Higher Learning Commission approval in May 2017 and enrolled its first cohort of eight FNP students that same month, making this one of the newer doctoral FNP programs in the state.
Graduates are eligible to sit for the national FNP certification exam through either the American Academy of Nurse Practitioners Certification Board or the American Nurses Credentialing Center. Passing that exam is the prerequisite for APRN licensure in every state.
Compare More Family NP Programs
- Indiana Wesleyan University - Marion
- Purdue Global - West Lafayette
- Purdue University - West Lafayette
- University of Indianapolis - Indianapolis
- University of Southern Indiana - Evansville