How a Rivier practicum placement comes together, start to finish

The whole path on one page

Rivier's 2026-2027 Nursing Student Handbook treats placement as your job on every MSN track and post-master's certificate, with the Clinical Practicum Coordinator and faculty in support. Here is the sequence the Handbook and Rivier's older practicum form lay out, one line per stage. Every stage has a fuller guide on this site.

1. Start the clock earlyRivier's advice is to begin looking a full year before the practicum term.
2. Line up the license and the stateYour RN license has to be valid where you will train, and that state has to be open to your track.
3. Find a clinician who fitsEach track sets its own rules on credentials, setting and experience.
4. Send the Preceptor Request FormIt carries three preceptor documents (license, credentials, CV) and sets the site contract moving.
5. Give the contract its timeRivier's current Handbook budgets 30 days for the agreement with the site.
6. Close out CastleBranchYour myCB account must be complete four months before practicum courses open.
7. Collect both sign-offsFaculty rule on the site, and the coordinator verifies the paperwork and contract.
8. Finish onboardingRivier's August CCP orientation, the facility's own orientation, and a printed ticket per clinical experience.
9. Begin on opening dayNothing logged before the semester opens counts, and FNP and PMHNP students fit 250 hours inside each practicum term.

Between a year and four months out: the search

This is the long stretch, and Rivier is honest about why. The Handbook calls NP clinical sites scarce, notes that out-of-state students come to New Hampshire hunting for preceptors too, and mentions schools that keep waiting lists. It invites you to put forward clinicians you know through work, and it promises help from faculty and the coordinator in locating a willing clinician, drawing on Rivier's contract resources, while making clear that your preferences may not be met.

A productive search tests each lead against the track rules before the first phone call, checks that the clinician's week can hold a semester of hours, and asks early whether the organization will contract with Rivier. The full method, with questions to settle before any paperwork, lives in finding your own preceptor.

Approval: two separate sign-offs

Two reviews close the loop, and hour one waits for both. Graduate faculty rule on whether the site suits your course. The coordinator, separately, checks off each required document and the signed contract, and no hour counts until that check is done. Rivier's older form also wants your preceptor approved and the agreement fully executed before you register, and it cautions that early registrants may be made to drop the course.

When a facility's own rules reach further than Rivier's, the facility's rules win. An agency may turn a student away over background check results or a vaccine exemption, and the Handbook states that Rivier is under no obligation to replace the site. A second lead kept in reserve is the practical answer; see when an agency says no and how the coordinator works.

Once the semester is running

After hours begin, the practicum runs through your course. A missed shift means an immediate heads-up to your preceptor and a prompt message to faculty, as the Handbook requires. Faculty cannot post a final grade until every required clinical hour is done, and a practicum grade under 84% ends your place in that graduate track, so the schedule you agree at the start carries weight all term.

For NURS 638P through NURS 640P, the 2025-26 catalog has your assigned faculty member watching your clinical logs and reading what your preceptor reports. Your course faculty will explain how hours are recorded in your own course. If anything changes at the site partway through, raise it with them early rather than in the final weeks. For pacing, read the 250 hours per semester guide.