Doing Samford clinicals where you already work
Samford's public pages leave the workplace question open for FNP and PMHNP students, so any rule sits in the NP Clinical Manual. The only employment rule Samford publishes belongs to the DNP Nurse Leader track, and it keeps practicum hours outside your job duties. Treat that as the safe default, ask before you count anything, and use your employer as a source of connections rather than a shortcut.
Check your workplace option
Tell us where you work and which course is next. We check the fit and line up a backup near home.
What Samford says about clinicals at your employer
For the FNP and PMHNP tracks, nothing in public. No program page, plan of study or section of the 2026-27 Graduate Nursing Student Handbook addresses rotations inside a student's own workplace. The handbook points NP students to the NP Clinical Manual in the Nurse Practitioner Homeroom, so that is the first place to look once your Canvas courses open; our guide to the NP Homeroom explains how the manual fits in.
Two nearby statements help frame it. The handbook expects graduate students to learn and follow the policies of every agency used for learning experiences, and that includes your employer the moment it becomes a clinical site. The online RN to BSN page, for a different program, encourages students to complete the practicum within their current health community. That wording is about staying local, not about working inside your own unit, so it settles nothing for NP rotations.
The Nurse Leader DNP rule
The DNP Nurse Leader page, for a post-master's track that is not accepting applications at this time, says practicum hours must be completed outside the student's employment roles and responsibilities. The same page describes 8 to 12 hours a week of in-person mentored practicum where the student lives and is licensed, with the academic advisor helping students who need to plan additional practicum experiences.
That rule belongs to the Nurse Leader track, not the NP tracks. It still shows how Samford draws the line between a job and a learning experience: the hours you count should be time spent as a student, doing work your job does not already ask of you. Plan any employer rotation around that idea and you are far less likely to be surprised when your course reviews it.
Count nothing until the rotation is approved. Samford reviews every clinical rotation request, and an older Samford MSN handbook required a completed affiliation agreement before any student activity at a practice site.
Why your employer is still a strong place to start
Samford's program pages call personal and professional connections essential to clinical placements close to home (read the full passage). For a working RN, the employer is where many of those connections already sit: nurse practitioners you have worked beside, physicians who know your work, clinic managers elsewhere in the same system.
An employer relationship can also shorten the paperwork. Samford holds affiliation agreements with hundreds of agencies, most of them in the Southeast, and its pages let students ask for new ones when a preceptor is available nearby. If your health system is already on Samford's list, one step is done. If not, a request can move while the preceptor conversation continues. Our page on affiliation agreements covers how that request works.
Colleagues also help when your own unit is the wrong fit. The NP who moved from your floor to an outpatient clinic, or the physician who covers a rural practice two days a week, may be the preceptor your course needs.
Keeping student hours separate from your job
If the NP Clinical Manual and your course faculty allow an employer rotation, these habits keep it clean and easy to defend:
- Pick a different settingRotate in a clinic or service line where you do not work shifts, so patients, staff and records know you as a student.
- Choose a preceptor who is not your managerA preceptor who also writes your performance review holds two roles at once. An NP or physician from another team keeps the evaluation honest.
- Keep clinical hours off the clockCount hours only on days you are there as a Samford student, outside any paid shift, unless your course faculty tells you otherwise.
- Wear the student badgeThe handbook specifies a badge showing the Samford logo, your name, graduate nursing student, your track and the Moffett & Sanders School of Nursing. Wear it during clinical time instead of your staff badge.
- Put the plan in writingYour manager, your preceptor and your course faculty should all know the arrangement before the first clinical day.
Questions to settle before you ask your employer
- Does the NP Clinical Manual, or your course, allow a rotation at a site where you are employed?
- Does Samford already hold an affiliation agreement with your employer, or will you request one?
- Does the system run students through its own onboarding? Huntsville Hospital's student page, for example, lists orientation modules and a student badge.
- Will your employer let you be on site in a student role on days you are not scheduled to work?
- Which coverage applies during student hours? Samford's handbook calls personal liability insurance required while its catalog calls it not required; see liability and health insurance.
- Does the practice see the patients your course needs, such as adults for
NURG 723or children and adults forNURG 724?
Bring the answers to your course faculty or program coordinator in one message. A clear plan with the setting, the preceptor and the schedule gets a faster, cleaner answer than an open question.
When your workplace does not fit the course
Hospital RN roles and FNP clinicals often point in different directions. NURG 723 FNP Clinical: Adult centers on adult patients, and NURG 724 FNP Clinical: Across the Lifespan needs children in the mix, which an adult inpatient unit cannot supply. An ICU or emergency department job rarely lines up with either course, however strong the nurses are.
PMHNP students meet the same problem from the other side. A medical-surgical job does not provide the psychiatric patients that NURG 788 and NURG 789 require. The employer may still help through its outpatient clinics or behavioral health service, or through colleagues who precept in other settings.
Where the workplace route closes, the search moves into your community. Our can't find a preceptor guide covers what to do in the first week of that search.
How we help with a workplace rotation or the alternative
Your placement advisor starts by testing the workplace route against the course: the setting, the preceptor's license and population, the clinic schedule, and whether an affiliation agreement already exists. When it works, we prepare the preceptor and site details for your rotation request so Samford sees a complete picture the first time.
If your employer's system needs a new affiliation agreement with Samford, we give you the site and preceptor details the request calls for, and we keep a second option moving until the agreement is in place.
When it does not, we find a preceptor near home who fits the course and keeps your job and your clinical hours in separate lanes. Keep both options open until approval arrives; we hold the backup ready while the first choice is reviewed. Start with the form below.
Questions Samford students ask
Can I do my Samford NP clinicals at the hospital where I work?
Samford's public documents are silent on this for the NP tracks, so the NP Clinical Manual and your course faculty decide. The cleanest version to propose is a different unit or outpatient clinic in the same system, with a preceptor who is not your supervisor and hours kept outside your shifts. Ask before you count a single hour.
Can my nurse manager be my preceptor?
Usually the question answers itself: most nurse managers are not APRNs or physicians, the roles Alabama's APRN preceptor definition names. Even when your manager is an NP, one person acting as both boss and clinical evaluator muddies both jobs. Choose an NP or physician from another team and keep your manager informed of the plan.
Do clinical hours count if I am being paid for the shift?
Samford's only published statement on paid time comes from the DNP Nurse Leader track, which keeps practicum hours outside employment roles and responsibilities. For FNP and PMHNP students, plan on clinical time that is separate from paid work unless the NP Clinical Manual or your course faculty says otherwise in writing.
Does the online RN to BSN practicum have to be at my job?
No. The RN to BSN page encourages students to complete the practicum within their current health community, which points to local organizations rather than your own unit. Samford does not publish practicum hours for that program, so follow your course instructions and ask the RN to BSN coordinator how the practicum is arranged.
Is a rotation at my employer approved faster?
Sometimes, because the relationships and possibly the affiliation agreement already exist. It is not automatic: Samford still reviews the rotation request, and the site still runs its own student process. A nearby practice where you have no job can move just as quickly when the preceptor and site details arrive complete.
Related pages
Last checked 2026-09-25
We check these pages against Samford's own program pages, plans of study, the 2026-27 Graduate Nursing Student Handbook and Alabama rules. Your course, your program coordinator and Graduate Student Services have the final word.
Samford says connections are essential. We are the connection.
Tell us your Samford track, where you live and when your next clinical course starts. We find preceptors near you who fit the course and prepare the details Samford needs to approve the rotation, including a new affiliation agreement where one is needed.
- Preceptors matched to the course: adult primary care for
NURG 723, family practice across the lifespan forNURG 724, psychiatric care forNURG 788 - Preceptor, license and site details ready for your clinical rotation request
- In your own community, anywhere Samford accepts you and your RN license is valid
Start your placement plan
Program, city and start date is all we need to begin.