Nursing Degree advice for Mature Student

Hi,

I am a mature student who wishes to do an Adult Nursing Degree. Ideally I would like to go down the Registered Nurse Degree Apprenticeship route but the last in-take in my area saw 600 applicants for 40 places so I am not holding out much hope!

I have Level 2 Maths and English, GCSE's in English and Science and an AS Level in English Language. I am also studying a Level 3 Advanced Apprenticeship Diploma in Senior Support Work through the hospital where I work as a Health Care Assistant.

Is it possible to discuss this directly with the Universities that run the course or is it set in stone that you need certain A Levels in order to be accepted?

I would be potentially looking at the following unis -

Plymouth
Southampton
Bournemouth
Brighton

Any advice greatly appreciated.

Jules

There are no A level requirements for nursing. Some universities demand A level biology which may be replaced by sociology or psychology but this is a university thing not an NMC requirement.
Your best option is to look at university entry requirements on their website for nursing degrees. This tells you what they commonly accept for A level/level 3 equivalent (and GCSE English/Maths which is usually C/4+ but you've already got these). Getting in contact with the universities you're looking at would also be a good idea to discuss various optins.

Thank you Emily x

Different universities have different requirements. My university required so many UCAS points but what subject that was in did not matter x

I wouldn't fret unnecessarily about applicants versus vacancies.

I recently had an interview for a MH Nurse undergraduate course (not apprenticeship) with a University where the Lecturer chairing the meeting told the group not to fret. Despite the X number of applicants being so very much greater than the X number of places, she expected a couple of hundred of the applicants (a large minority) would not meet the criteria and would not make it to interview.

Also, she expected another 100 plus to not turn up for their interviews which was a surprise to the group. Why would you apply for a nursing course which always interviews their candidates and then avoid the selection process!? But she was adamant that this was another factor that meant our odds are greater than we think.

Then she said a large minority would only have applied to their University as a back up option and would prefer to accept a place elsewhere (I live in an area where a lot of students want to live at home and have a choice of 3 universities in the area that run identical nursing courses so they tend to just want to attend the closest one geographically).

I can't remember the figures for applicants versus places but got the impression that what looked to be at the outset at a 1 in 10 chance of getting a place might be more like 1 in 3 once some basic sifting and offers from other Unis had taken place.