Advance your practice
Tied for #3 in the nation
Of schools offering a Doctor of Nursing Practice degree, with multiple top ranked tracks.
U.S. World News Report
$3.8M in funding
147 DNP scholarships funded in 2023-24, totaling $3.8 million.
Pre-arranged clinicals
We manage your clinicals, setting us apart from most other DNP programs.
A Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) degree at the University of Washington gives you the best of both worlds: advanced training in specialty practice areas and strategies for translating leading-edge research findings to practice under the mentorship of nationally recognized faculty. In 2008, UW started the first DNP program on the West Coast. Since then, it has remained the standard of excellence for the terminal degree in nursing practice. Our DNP graduates are integral leaders in diverse healthcare settings, translating leading-edge research into better patient outcomes.
A path to fit your passion
Tailor your DNP program with a track specialization:
The Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) curriculum at the UW School of Nursing is designed to equip you with advanced clinical and leadership skills. You’ll engage in a rigorous, evidence-based education that prepares you to influence healthcare outcomes, lead in complex systems, and advocate for patients and communities. Through immersive clinical experiences and interdisciplinary coursework, you’ll gain the expertise needed to excel as a healthcare leader and advance your practice to the highest level.
Year one of the DNP program is offered in a hybrid format (50 percent in-person, 50 percent distance learning), and requires that you be on campus one day per week. You will complete core DNP academic classwork with peers across all DNP tracks in the School of Nursing. Content of year one courses includes:
- leadership
- appraisal and application of evidence to advance practice
- health equity
- health systems and policy
- wellness and health promotion, and
- quality improvement
In year 2, nurse practitioner and clinical nurse specialist students establish the foundation of advanced practice education of the lifespan, which includes:
- pathophysiology
- advanced physical assessment, and
- pharmacology
Students build upon this in track-specific advanced assessment, diagnosis/management, and pharmacology. You will gain advanced practice skills from these academic and lab courses to move into clinical placements during spring quarter.
Population Health & Systems leadership students establish the foundation of advanced practice education with regard to population health equity and systems, which includes:
- collaborating with community partners
- systems thinking
- population health leadership
- epidemiology and informatics
Students build competency through track-specific courses that include requirements outside of the School of Nursing and across domestic, global, and environmental systems. You will gain advanced practice skills from academic courses that will support you in your application of your learning in practice, during clinical placements starting in spring quarter.
As in year two, many courses require in-person attendance, with some courses including distance learning methods. In the final year of your program, you will continue clinical training.
In addition, you will work with your supervisory committee to complete a DNP final project in collaboration with a local clinical agency or organization. This project is presented in the form of a final examination.
The Doctor of Nursing Practice program has nine goals focused on preparing advanced practice nurses (approved by graduate voting faculty in October 2012) who are able to:
- Provide advanced nursing care to individuals, families, communities, and populations.
- Create, manage, and evaluate innovative programs and practices of care for diverse populations.
- Appraise and utilize current technologies to advance the quality and accessibility of care.
- Demonstrate enhanced clinical and health-related investigative competencies.
- Critique and selectively translate science to guide clinical decision-making and program development.
- Evaluate and influence health policy and systems.
- Provide leadership and inter-professional collaboration in multiple health-related arenas.
- Evaluate and influence accessibility and quality of care across diverse, underserved, and vulnerable populations.
- Demonstrate critical interrogation of positionality, recognition of implicit biases, as well as knowledge and application of anti-racism principles to promote health equity.
- An in-process or earned bachelor’s or master’s degree in nursing from a nursing program that is accredited by a national accrediting body recognized by the US Department of Education (e.g., CCNE, NLN, ACEN). A nursing degree must be completed prior to beginning your program of study.
- A minimum cumulative Grade Point Average (GPA) of 3.0, or a 3.0 GPA for the last 60 semester/90 quarter graded college/university credits
- Completion of a graded, for-credit basic course in descriptive and inferential statistics (three credits/one quarter):
- Autumn 2025 start: completed between January 2020 and September 2025
- Autumn 2026 start: completed between January 2021 and September 2026
- Meet the Essential Behaviors for DNP students
- Have an active, unrestricted Washington state RN license by the time you begin your program of study
- If you hold an ARNP license, that must also be active and unrestricted in Washington state
- International applicants must have an active, unrestricted U.S. RN license at the time of application; if you hold an ARNP license, that must also be an active, unrestricted U.S. license
- If your native language is not English, proof of proficiency in English (including spoken English)
- Some tracks may have additional requirements
- Complete and submit our online application
- Apply via the UW Grad School (use the new application system to apply for Autumn 2024)
- Pay a non-refundable application fee
- Order transcripts from each college or university you have ever attended
- We accept unofficial transcripts, but you must submit official transcripts if you are admitted and enroll in the DNP program
- If you earned a degree from a school, that degree must appear on the transcript with the date it was conferred
- If you earned a degree from a school outside of the United States, upload an official transcript translated to English and include a detailed credential/transcript evaluation
- You do not need to include a foreign transcript if you attended a foreign university through a study abroad program and the credits appear on your school’s transcript
- Resume
- Four admissions essays
- Optional statement
- You may use an optional statement to explain if you think your transcripts, resume, or admissions essay responses do not accurately reflect your abilities and preparedness for the DNP program, if you have breaks in education or employment, or if you wish to share instances where you achieved academic merit despite significant obstacles, if you are a first-generation graduate student, or if your academics, scholarship, and research promote cultural diversity
- Statistics course information
- Nurse licensure information (if applicable)
- Three letters of recommendation
- Proof of English proficiency if English is not your first language