University of Louisiana at Lafayette offers an MSN Family Nurse Practitioner Track.
Program Tracks Overview
| Program | Est. Tuition | Est. Duration | Credit Hours |
|---|---|---|---|
| MSN | $20.2K–$21.6K | 2.5 years | 42–45 |
UL Lafayette’s defining feature is that the degree is awarded through a four-university state consortium — the Intercollegiate Consortium for a Master of Science in Nursing (ICMSN), running since 1986 — so the same FNP courses and pooled faculty serve McNeese State, Nicholls State, Southeastern Louisiana, and UL Lafayette. The trade-off is geographic: every FNP clinical hour must be completed in Louisiana, which rules the program out for nurses practicing elsewhere despite the flat, residency-blind $480 per credit.
Quick Facts
| Feature | Details |
|---|---|
| Program Types | MSN — Family Nurse Practitioner concentration (BSN entry) |
| Format | Online; no campus visits stated. Clinicals completed in Louisiana |
| Clinical Hours | 600–750 precepted hours — sources conflict |
| Clinical Placement | Not clearly stated |
| Population | Primary care, staged by age group across three specialty courses |
| Distinctive Coursework | Focused Scholarly Project or thesis required; Population-Based Primary Care |
| Clinical Location Restriction | All FNP clinical hours must be completed in Louisiana |
| RN License Requirements | Active, unencumbered Louisiana RN license; catalog also lists multistate |
| Cohort Limits | Enrollment capped; applicants ranked by GPA when seats are limited |
| Start Terms | Two cohorts a year: Fall and Spring |
| Tuition | $480/credit for online graduate students; no out-of-state surcharge |
| Accreditation | CCNE (ICMSN master’s program); SACSCOC (institutional) |
MSN — Family Nurse Practitioner Concentration
The estimated tuition for the Family Nurse Practitioner MSN concentration at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette is approximately $20,160–$21,600 (42–45 credits at $480/credit).
The program can generally be completed in about five semesters, with the range depending on whether you take the three-credit scholarly project or the six-credit thesis.
MSN Curriculum
Foundation courses. The first two semesters are a conventional graduate core — theory, statistics, evidence generation — paired with the advanced practice science sequence of pathophysiology, pharmacotherapeutics, and health assessment with diagnostic reasoning. Nothing here separates UL Lafayette from its peers, and that’s the point: the differentiation sits in what follows.
FNP specialty sequence. The three Family Health courses are each five credits and each carry heavy weekly lab contact hours, and they are staged by patient age rather than by clinical setting. Family Health I covers pediatrics and childbearing women, II moves to adolescents and adults, and III concentrates on geriatrics. Many FNP programs run generic “Primary Care I / II / III” practicums where the population mix depends on whatever preceptor a student lands. UL Lafayette’s structure forces deliberate exposure to each age band in sequence, which matters if you’re worried about graduating strong in adult medicine and thin in peds.
Scholarly requirement. Every student completes either a Focused Scholarly Project (3 credits) or a thesis (6 credits). This is increasingly rare in FNP master’s programs, most of which have replaced the thesis with a capstone portfolio or dropped it entirely. It adds workload and, on the thesis path, three extra credits of tuition. It also makes the degree a cleaner on-ramp to doctoral study, and BSN-to-DNP students can substitute doctoral courses for several MSN requirements.
- NURS 518 — Pathophysiology for Advanced Practice Nursing (3)
- NURS 507 — Health Assessment and Diagnostic Reasoning for Advanced Practice (3)
- NURS 517 — Pharmacotherapeutics for Advanced Practice Nursing (3)
- NURS 509 — Population-Based Primary Care (3)
- NURS 582 — Advanced Practice Nursing: Family Health I (5)
- NURS 583 — Advanced Practice Nursing: Family Health II (5)
- NURS 584 — Advanced Practice Nursing: Family Health III (5)
- NURS 581 — Business, Leadership and Health Policy for Nurse Practitioners (3)
- NURS 595 — Focused Scholarly Project (3) or NURS 599 — Thesis Research and Thesis (6)
More curriculum details are available here.
MSN Clinical Requirements
- NOTE: Conflicting totals. The current university catalog requires a minimum of 750 precepted clinical hours. The School of Nursing’s own FNP requirements page states 600. Both are live pages; the school page has not been updated since 2018.
- Hours are concentrated in three courses: NURS 582 (12 weekly lab contact hours), NURS 583 (14), and NURS 584 (14).
- Course math: 12 + 14 + 14 = 40 weekly lab contact hours across three semesters. Over standard 15-week terms that derives to roughly 600 hours — matching the school page, not the catalog.
- NURS 507 carries an additional 4 weekly lab contact hours (roughly 60). Whether these skills hours count toward the precepted total is not clearly stated.
- All FNP clinical hours must be completed in Louisiana.
- Placement model — who secures preceptors and sites — is not clearly stated.
The practical range here is 600 to 750 hours. At 600 you are comfortably above the 500-hour national certification floor and squarely inside the 600–700 band most FNP programs sit in; at 750 you are at the upper end and should budget for a heavier final year. The gap is worth resolving in writing before you enroll, because 150 hours is roughly four extra weeks of full-time clinical work. The Louisiana-only rule is the more consequential constraint: it is not a paperwork hurdle you can waive, and it effectively defines who this program is for. Get the placement answer in writing too — a program that restricts clinicals to one state may or may not take responsibility for finding you a site in it.
MSN Admissions
The GPA bar is lower than most graduate nursing programs, but admission is capped and competitive, and two source pages disagree on the degree and license requirements.
- BSN from an ACEN- or CCNE-accredited U.S. program. The catalog states only “a baccalaureate degree from an accredited undergraduate program.”
- Minimum 2.75 cumulative undergraduate GPA on a 4.0 scale.
- GRE is not required.
- Active, unencumbered Louisiana RN license. The catalog states “Louisiana or Multistate.”
- Completed undergraduate statistics course and a lifespan physical assessment course.
- Three letters of reference, at least one from a recent supervisor or employer.
- Letter of application covering goals, intended contributions, and post-graduation practice plans.
- Resume or CV and evidence of immunization.
- Applications accepted year-round for Fall and Spring entry; the Fall deadline runs annually on June 30.
- Seats are limited. When enrollment must be capped, applicants are ranked by GPA.
- No minimum RN work experience is stated.
Tuition
Estimated total tuition is $20,160 for the 42-credit scholarly project path and $21,600 for the 45-credit thesis path. The published rate is $480 per credit hour for graduate students in 100% online programs — $1,440 per three-credit course — and the university states there are no out-of-state fees, so the total is the same regardless of where you live.
- Both totals are derived estimates (credits × $480), not published program totals.
- The $480 rate is the university-wide online graduate rate rather than an FNP-specific published rate.
- Mandatory fees beyond the per-credit rate — program fees, clinical or technology fees, differentials — are not clearly stated for this program.
- Choosing the thesis adds three credits, roughly $1,440.
- No tuition lock or cohort pricing guarantee is published; rates can move year to year.
Official tuition details are available here.
Until the fee schedule for online graduate nursing is confirmed, treat roughly $20,000–$22,000 as a tuition floor rather than an all-in cost.
Why Choose This FNP Program?
Best suited for nurses who already live and hold a license in Louisiana, want a low-cost public MSN, and are willing to write a scholarly project or thesis to get it.
The consortium structure is the real story. Because the MSN is delivered through ICMSN, the curriculum, faculty, and course delivery are shared across four public universities and have been refined jointly since 1986. In practice that means a small regional campus is not building an FNP program alone with three faculty and a borrowed syllabus — the specialty courses are backed by a statewide faculty pool with distance-education experience. That is a quieter advantage than a placement guarantee, but it shows up in curriculum stability.
The cost case is straightforward. At $480 per credit with no residency surcharge, the degree lands in the low $20,000s before fees, which puts it well under most private and many public FNP master’s programs. The age-staged Family Health sequence is a genuine curricular strength, and the 2.75 GPA minimum keeps the door open for strong nurses whose undergraduate transcripts were uneven.
The constraints are equally clear. Clinicals must happen in Louisiana, and the program states it prepares graduates for Louisiana licensure — if you plan to practice elsewhere, check portability before applying. The scholarly project or thesis is real academic work on top of a full clinical load, which some working nurses will find valuable and others will find an unwanted detour. Placement responsibility is unstated. And the school’s published clinical-hour figure disagrees with its own catalog by 150 hours, which is exactly the kind of question to put in an email to the program office before you commit a semester’s tuition.
Accreditation
The master’s degree program in nursing at the Intercollegiate Consortium for a Master of Science in Nursing — a consortium of McNeese State University, Nicholls State University, Southeastern Louisiana University, and the University of Louisiana at Lafayette — is accredited by the Commission on Collegiate Nursing Education (CCNE), and the program is fully approved by the Louisiana State Board of Nursing. The University of Louisiana at Lafayette is institutionally accredited by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Colleges (SACSCOC) to award baccalaureate, master’s, and doctoral degrees, verified from the university’s own accreditation page. The school states that graduates meet the educational requirements to sit for the national FNP certification exam (AANP or ANCC) and to apply for advanced practice licensure; it does not spell out dual eligibility, so confirm which exam pathway applies if that matters to you.
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