Post-Master's DNP Admissions Webinar

Hi can everyone hear me if you can just.

Type in the chat box if you can hear me.

OK great thank you everyone.

Welcome to our post Masters DNP web and R my name is Jamie Bergstein. I'm the associate director of graduate admissions here at Penn Nursing. I'm joined by doctor Sue runs and doctor Kate to Mutus. The program director and associate program director of the post. Masters DNP Program Lizzy. Lee, the program manager for the program and Melissa Lee, the director of admissions here, I Penn Nursing.

Just a few things to note about the web and are we ask that you use a laptop or desktop computer with Chrome or Firefox to fully participate, some of the event features won't be available if you use a mobile device or other browsers were unable to troubleshoot during the presentation so all of a sudden, it goes blank or you can hear us. We recommend just refreshing the browser website. Please save your questions for the end of the presentation you'll type them in the chat box.

A recording of this presentation will be available in a few days and if you need closed captioning. Just click on the CC button on the Top right. I've highlighted in red, but it will look like and you will get close captioning.

So now I will kick it off and hand it to.

Cape.

Hi. Thank you for joining us my name is Kate Tim Unison on the associate director of the DNP program here at Penn and I'm also the track directory for adult Gerontology Primary Care Nurse Practitioner Program, I've been practicing as a nurse practitioner for 20 years in primary care and I look forward to helping you gain more information about our DMP and how it can augment your career.

And hi everyone, my name is Sue Wrens and I'm a program director for the DNP program. I'm also the program director for the primary care nurse practitioner program, which is a program that overseas the operations of the 6 primary care tracks. Here Penn Nursing at the Masters Level I am a board certified Geriatric Nurse Practitioner I've been practicing.

For 32 years with my focus of care being mostly on nursing home residents. I have a DNP from New York University in 2012.

And then went on to complete my pH D from the University of Arizona.

In 2017 again the focus of both my DNP project and also my PhD was on communication practices between nurses and physicians in the long term care environment.

And Lyzeum Melissa do you want to introduce yourselves sure quickly again my name is Melissa Lee. I'm the director of emissions of regulatory compliance here at the School of Nursing and thank you for joining us this afternoon. And my name is Lizzy. Lee I'm the program manager and I work closely with Sue and Kate to help administer the program.

So, in front of you as a slide about the Post Masters. DNP program goal and you can all read that so I'm not going to read you the text but.

For those of you who joined us today and for many people who apply to our program or DNP programs. In general, you know, one of the overarching questions is why the DNP and why the DNP versus the PhD and really the way that we, as a faculty and program leadership look at it is the DNP distinguishes from the PhD in terms of it's a practice doctor, it versus the PhD with which is a research doctorate.

And the practice doctor, it really prepares you all as nurses who many of you have years of experience. Or maybe not. Many years of experience that as a an advanced practice nurse or someone who's gained their Masters in health leadership. It really gives you the skills to become future leaders in the clinical environment.

One of the things that I recognized as a both DNP and PhD is that now more than ever DMP. Zen PhD prepared practitioners and also faculty work very well together, because the DNP really is. The clinical expert. We are the providers that are able to interpret for researchers. What is actually going on at the bedside So what we really hope to achieve through our program.

Is really preparing you all for the next level of leadership and giving you the skills to be able to conduct your own and implement your own practice change project to lead practice innovation and change in your respective healthcare environments.

So let's talk, for a minute about the curriculum.

And I'll just go on and then keep will talk a little more about kind of the format for our program here. But here are a list of the courses that are contained in our DMP program and you can see some of the core.

Horses data analytics, which teaches you really about the skills to analyze and interpret data. That's generated from a project principles of quality and patient safety again reinforcing some of the principles of conducting a quality improvement project and how that might impact patient safety. We have healthcare Economics and Business planning, which is our business course that teaches students about.

How to create and manage a budget and how to develop and implement a business case for implementation nursing informatics obviously a healthcare leadership course Epidemiology and then apolosi course and you might ask well. Why these courses well. If you look at the ASEAN essentials, which really is. The organization that provided the backbone or the direction for DMP programs.

These are required courses or required course content for any DNP program.

Additionally, we have 4 project courses, so different schools. Call it different things. Some quality capstone project or quality improvement project. We call them project courses because we don't really know.

And you might not know as you enter into a program what kind of project that you might want to do it could be a quality improvement project could be a practice evaluation or program evaluation. It could actually be an innovation project or could be apolosi project, so these courses. These 4 horses give you the skills to really take a project from start to finish first by looking at the evidence to see how the evidence supports a project that you want to implement.

Project planning an implementation is really equivalent to writing a proposal and then implementing an actual project and then. Lastly, the project evaluation and dissemination is pulling it all together looking at your data? What did your project actually generate in terms of new knowledge or reinforcement of existing knowledge and how is that going to create change in your practice environment and then Lastly? How you're going to disseminate?

Your project to the entity you know the practice environment where you actually conducted the project and or perhaps in a Journal as a publication.

So Azar DNP program is going forward. We have now offerings of all these courses online. Initially, RDNP program was hybrid and some of the courses were offered in the seeds. But we've now fully transitioned to an online program So what does that mean for your schedule for post Masters DNP students. We are gearing the program toward people that are much like all of all of you who are working professionals and so courses are done and.

Asynchronous format which basically means the courses are offered an you work at your own pace. So you have coursework content that you're given and then assignments an follow-up learning discussions that you'll do fully online within that you will have access to the course faculty and there could be more personal meetings online as needed. So the benefits of online learning is that there's really no constraint of time and place. You don't have to log on at a certain time.

And it really allows students to work at their own pace. One guideline that we give students so that they have an idea of how much time to put aside to devote to of course, is that generally if of course, is offered for 3 hours of content per week. You will probably want to set aside approximately 9 hours of time to do the prep and the reading in the studying and the assignments that are required to be successful in the course.

Some people might ask his online learning less rigorous than in the seats, and many of you have completed your Baccalaureate and Masters Education, probably learned the way that we all did which was traditionally in classroom listening to lectures and deliverables to be able to demonstrate the Met that the course requirements tests or papers and Whatnot and so some online courses or online programs first emerged.

There was a thought that perhaps online learning was not as rigorous as in the seats types of format, and what we can say to that is this.

It definitely is rigorous or as rigorous what it requires is Kate was pointing out is that you have to be able to set aside time that you're going to dedicate to each other courses that are part of the DMP curriculum that was on the previous slide that I showed you.

So what that means is that the courses are geared to advance your own learning. It doesn't mean that you don't have contact with the professor because you certainly do and many of us who teach in the program have set aside time for student hours. If you will, or meetings via blue jeans to really talk to students about how things are going in the course and to answer questions and of course, there's always email and Phone calls.

But the courses are designed.

More or less in a modular format where each week, there's a topic.

A type of activity geared towards that topic so perhaps reading or voice over PowerPoint or perhaps videos and then some activity related to that particular topic to help further advanced learning so for example, there might be a discussion board post an answering others discussion board posts are responding to this post. There actually might be teaching the business course right now, we're last week, we actually had an Excel.

Of spreadsheet type of assignment where the students could actually implement some of what was learned in each of the videos and the greetings so there's some activities so it's kind of like reading.

Viewing and the doing and what we have found an all the instructors in the relative courses have found is that by using this type of format.

We were able to meet the course objectives, which are clearly outlined in the syllabi and that it provides a solid foundation for you to get to the project horses and complete your project within that that 4 project course timeline.

So, in terms of the application requirements. These are the ones that Penn Nursing has developed and implemented. We like you to have a Masters degree in a nursing field so we don't require you to be a nurse practitioner. We have students currently in our program, have a Masters in health leadership as an example for administration.

That you've graduated the GPA of 3.2 or higher from your respective schools that you've completed a graduate level research methods course with the greater beer higher.

We asked for a copy of your or in and or a PRN if applicable license that will be 2 essay questions for those of you have already started an application. Hopefully many of you have you can see that.

The two essay questions really are geared to for us as a committee to ascertain your interest in the program and what you bring to the table and also to be able to articulate why you want a DNP the 3 letters of recommendation, obviously your transcripts and then.

If you if applicable for non native English speaking applicants at 04 or.

IELTS exam.

So these are the requirements for Penn Penn Nursing. I don't let me just.

Slip to the next slide here. The one thing I do want to say about the the application requirements is kind of like the applications are open right now, we have an application deadline of November, 1st. But what happens is and I don't know if Jamie or Kate. You want to talk about this a little bit more is kind of like what happens once the application is submitted.

And then how does it get to us?

Sure, I can talk about that, so our final deadline is November 1st. But as many of you are aware if you submit your application. By October, 4th you will receive a fee waiver. There's nothing. You need to do after you submit as long as you submit by October, 4th at 11:59 PM. Eastern Standard Time, we will go in and waive the fee.

There's no other benefit to doing that, your application will be reviewed any faster, but you do save some money so that is a large benefit after your application is submitted one of our admissions staff members will need to review it to make sure your application is complete and we're not missing any materials. Excuse me that could take a few days that could take a few weeks, so we do just ask for your patients will.

I'm keep you up to date and we will process your application as quickly as possible. Then there is a review from both the admission side Anna faculty member side. We have our own DNP admissions committee, we review all the applications.

Amen again that can take a few weeks to a few months, so you may not hear back from us until mid December or even early January, so again. We do ask for your patients and then you'll be invited to interview which will be in. I believe early February or late January annual receive more information about that, if you're invited to interview.

So we will ask students to come to campus for the new student orientation and summer intensives. We started that this year. And so the first 2 days of the program were really nice. It was a time for the new students that were in the cohort to come to campus to meet the faculty in person and they also had some time to mingle a bit with the PhD students. During that time, not only do you get an overview to the school but we also plan specific workshops that will?

Help you down the road with the coursework in particular, the project course work that you won't start for another year after the program begins but this year, we offered workshops on evidence based practice. We allowed four time for our library, experts to come over and meet our new students and also did a brief intensive on scholarly writing.

We've also decided that in year 2 of the program will ask the students to come back to campus prior to launching the part of the project courses, so that they have time to meet with their faculty mentor here on campus and begin the discussion about data collection an evidence based practice and also some leadership format.

And before we go into the questions and answers the other benefit of having on campus. Intense is is for all of you to feel like you're part of a cohort again back to the point about online programs that you will.

See each other in class if you will and can work together and projects in various courses where you would actually get to know each other a little bit better. I can say that my PhD program was completely online and they had intensives every summer and that was a time for the cohort to get together and really mingle Ann.

Help support each other and get feedback on our research and Whatnot. This is a time for all of you as perspective students to come together and do the same, the last.

Group that we had the Cape Reference. They were here. The last week in August for the first 2 days of that week and they left after Day 2, feeling very much cohesive as a group. I think Lizzie help them create a page together, so they could communicate and they were really asking at the end of that intensive to figure out ways to stay connected because let's face it. This is a doctoral program and you need all the support that you can get.

So that's another good reason other than us, providing you with some tools from experts to help advance your project and your knowledge, but again at time for you to interface with your program faculty your faculty mentors and your fellow students.

And see the other only other thing that I would mention before we take questions is that because of the online form. At one of the things that we all take very seriously is student engagement. An it's a priority for Sue Ann Lizzie and I to be in really good contact with our students so that we don't feel like we're missing any of the challenges that might come up throughout the program and also hearing some of the highlights of the growth of the student throughout the program so we're initiating things like.

Online or monthly chats where we feature maybe a DMP leader or expert from our school to talk about the project that they did throughout their own program and how that has made an impact on their practice day today.

And we had our first we call them quicker chats being our first. Quaker chat 2 weeks ago and Kate invited a colleague of hers from Villanova, who completed or DNP and all of the students that are in the current postmasters. Koparan one from the previous code were tuned in. We're on the blue jeans for an hour and it went really well so we're really looking forward to that being an ongoing process to help again further education.

Giving you an opportunity ask questions of people have already completed their DNP.

And 2, two again support each other as a cohort and also for questions for any of us to.

So I see 1 question there if you've completed your degrees from Penn. We do still request that you get transcripts from order transcripts from Penn. It wouldn't be that our office of Student Affairs would automatically.

Search for them go hide Jamie so we do ask even if you went to Penn that you upload your unofficial transcript. You should be able to download that will be able to get your official transcript. If Europe, an alumni. But we do ask that you upload your unofficial one and you'll still need to send in your own request for verification of clinical hours. We can't do that.

The next question I see is about.

Submiting verification of your Masters degree clinical hours if you have a degree and it wasn't in as a nurse practitioner, perhaps with your Masters degree. You had some kind of project that you had to do a clinical project and I would say that I wouldn't necessarily worry right now about the submission of those hours. It's not a requirement for you to get into the program. We have other students in the program who completed some type of.

Project.

Uh.

Or fellowship if you will that they got verification from their program that that involved some type of clinical. You need 1000 hours total between your Masters degree. Annuar DNP so don't overly stress about that will work it out with you and will be able to help you kind of craft that request from your whatever school you got your Masters degree from.

Kate you want to handle the next one from Lauren sure since the program is on line are kind of loose number for cap is about 25 to 30 students. We need to make sure that in each cohort. We have the resources to provide you enough attention, with the on line format and with mentoring students through project courses.

The next question is about how connect with faculty mentor. If you're admitted to the program so that's a great question, we?

We work with you once you're admitted before you start your first project course, which is in the summer after you matriculate and based on your area of interest, either during the interview process or even during that that intensive when you're here for that first summer. Kate, an I an Lizzy have a really good idea. We were very familiar with the faculty here and the people who are willing to mentor DMP students. We try to match you with someone who would be really.

Suited for your particular topic.

So we really hope during those times that you're here in person that we get to introduce you if it doesn't happen in person. Technology is a wonderful thing, Blue Jeans is amazing or for those of you who Skype we would definitely set up something for you to meet with your faculty mentor, so that you get to know them and get to kind of map out how we're going to proceed with your project.

You want to handle this woman's Ville.

And the deferred so the question is, is we are admitted this year. Can you defer admission till twenty twenty one the short answer is maybe you really have to provide us with a reason for the deferment, but also we prefer that you apply when you know you're ready to start.

So I think if there's any doubt of whether or not you could start in 2020. You may want to consider whether or not you should apply we understand that things come up you're all working professionals and we will absolutely.

Consider reasons for deferment, but you would have to submit a request.

About the next question is an MPH count.

No Eminem pH does not count as a Masters in a nursing field.

Terms of the references someone asked a certain is an academic reference required or can, we send two of another type of reference.

So an academic reference is not required in this case that you're asking about we understand that many of you have been out of school for quite a number of years and you might not have a strong connection to a faculty member or advisor. We understand that we really want to see the three strongest recommendations possible so if you can find someone who could perhaps speak to your ability to perform.

In an academic program if you did a research project or evidence based project in your career if you have a manager or former manager who has a DNP and can speak to your ability to perform in the DNP program that would also be acceptable.

I can also take the next question. How long are the admissions essays is there a Max there really isn't a Max most essays or anywhere from one two. I'd say, 3 pages at the most. I would say if there any longer you should seriously consider editing gracies down?

Uh parts of the program that are Wharton, based I can speak to that. This is Sue the business course that I code lead with.

An instructor who is

I think the CFO at Doylestown Hospital. There are Wharton modules, so Wharton online develop business modules that we, we have rights to use in our business course, so that's the part of the program that is Wharton based certainly.

At some point when we open up an executive leadership. DNP we will have more involvement with Wharton in terms of some of the other programs that they offer.

You don't have to currently be working as a nurse or a nurse practitioner to be admitted to the program.

So have you met wonder do you need experience as an advanced practice nurse to apply to the program and you really don't we would say to you, though, that if you just graduated from a program. It does really help to have some experience as a nurse practitioner because typically the projects. You know the questions or change projects. Do emanate or originate from the bedside. So it does help some students to really.

Be able to formulate there.

And project and in their workplace.

Question about the admission interview being in person is true, yes will bring you here to campus and do an interview face to face.

We also as much as we would love for you to come to our interview day. We have a dinner the night before and will also feed you that day as well. We understand not. Everyone can make it to campus. So we can arrange a virtual interview. But we do anticipate that most people will come for our in person interview day.

So, in terms of the question about the anticipated 25 students, except book or.

We just go back up.

We have a 2 year plan is study so there's really no full time or part time it is a two year.

11 credit or 10 course program and this speaks to someone else's question about the clarification of the semesters. That means you matriculate in the fall, so for those applications that are being submitted now where we are looking for matriculation.

For the fall of 2020.

Then you have spring and summer and you graduate the following summer so you finish it's actually 6 semesters.

10 course 10 courses that you have to complete a 2 year plan of study.

Does being a pen Alam influence acceptance acceptance rates?

And no it does not we have a holistic application process. We certainly get quite a few Penn Alumni because they know how great our programs are but we're looking at all. Parts of your application and where you went to school is not a factor for us.

So, just to clarify the question about the clinical hours. We do take into account the amount of hours that were done in your Masters program and then there are hours built into the DNP program curriculum and together they need to be 1000 hours in total.

2 people have asked about executive leadership. We are in the development stages of that. We're looking, possibly to launch applications next summer.

Or matriculation in the fall of 2021.

Yeah, the midwife, yeah, you got a healthy cushion there, if you've done a lot of hours in your Masters program and also your as an FNP in good shape.

Any other questions all summer, yeah, dressed up 1.

So do you wanna talk about kind of what the difference between the executive leadership DNP would be compared to a post Masters?

Yeah, I think that the so someone's asked about the criteria for admission, so the executive leadership. DNP program is really going to be looking at applicants that have had leadership or managerial experience and who have?

Had experience with managing budgets and or perhaps some have gotten their MBA or had the equivalent in management experience. So it is a little there will be different admission criteria compared to the Post Masters DNP.

I can speak to the break between semesters. The fall semester ends typically in the middle of December and then the spring semester starts up.

Typically around the 3rd week of January, so there's a nice winter break, the spring semester, usually ends by the 1st week of May and then the summer semester will begin by the end of May. There's also a break between summer and fall from approximately the 1st week of August till the very last week of August when classes resume again.

Lizzie when addressed the Quaker chat, yeah, so the quicker chats just to refresh. It's a once a month video call. We use a platform called Blue Jeans, similar to zoom or Skype and we get a faculty oral, um at the School of Nursing who has a DMP when we bring him in just to kind of expand your professional network as well and you'll be able to talk with them and they'll give an overview of their career and also.

Their DNP project experience and kind of how that has impacted or help them along their career journey and those monthly quicker traps are also a time where the cowarts can come together and just kind of do like face to face check in with sukatan I and just be able to talk about how things are going and that's a chance to give feedback and kind of connect in person. But through video and they are only viewable for students in the program currently.

So someone asked tips for the interviewer interview prep. I think now having gone through this process for 2 cohorts. I think that really the best way to kind of you the interview is to think about what those essay questions have asked you and to be able to discuss that with the faculty or staff that are part of the interview process. So I don't. I don't remember if he said. This Jamie but we usually have interviewed I ads and so when you're here in person.

The night before we have a nice dinner where you get to meet some of the get to meet us and some of the other faculty that are involved in the program.

And also the people that are part of the Admissions Committee, who will be conducting the interviews.

If you came to an interview and you really were an if you were asked the question why do you want a DNP and you weren't prepared to answer that that could that could be problematic so you really want to think about why the DNP and also while we don't require that you have all the components. The pieces of a project put together 'cause you can't possibly really conceptualize that before you're in a program you might want to think about it.

An area of interest something that excites you some questions that have come up through your own practice that you would like to investigate further some change that you'd like to see in a process where you currently work as an example, something that you could discuss that would really provide a foundation for obtaining the DNP.

I hope that makes sense. I think that applicants who are not clear about that.

Tend to struggle with the interview because it leaves the interviewers with the question well, then why do you want a DNP if you don't really know what you're going to do with it after graduation?

I can say that.

There's a lot written about the DNP it. You know it has been around the degree has been around for awhile. But I think the acceptance of the degree in kind of the questions people have about what am I. What am I hoping it. How's it. Going to change me? What am I hoping to do with it after graduation?

There's a lot you can read about that, but formulate that answer for yourself. What really resonates with you and why you would want to come to Penn Nursing to get that degree.

So there's a question about if students use their work environment for their project and the answer to that is. Yes, that makes the most sense because you have access to that, setting and whether you're doing a project that directly effects patients or other colleagues or staff in your practice setting. It just makes life a little bit easier. If you use this setting that you work in regularly if we have a student or a group that is not?

Employed at the time, then there are options that we can help you find for settings to do the project in?

Great questions someone asked how many faculty at Penn have their DMP.

And then our schools, like Penn getting on board with faculty having a DMP and not a PhD or are there mostly people have both I'm the only one that has both I think and I wouldn't recommend that unless you want to be in school for a long time and the reason that I did pursue my PhD was because my DNP project left me with questions that I knew I could only answer through a PhD there. There were questions and pH. DS dissertations look for gaps in knowledge.

It looks for questions that have not been answered yet and or haven't been researched. If you will so that is the only reason that I pursued it. The interesting thing is that we have quite a few faculty who have their DNP. Most her not full time faculty, but a lot who teach in our programs at the Masters level anhuar mentoring students at the doctoral program.

What I can say and I think what we all experienced recently was this year with this cohort that started in August. We had our first doctoral reception where the PhD students and the DNP students came together for their doctoral reception.

And many of the faculty who are pH, mostly PhD prepared and who are high level. Researchers are excited about the fact that we have DMP students here and want to figure out ways for DMP MPH seeds to interact with each other and also for those faculty to mentor. DMP students with research projects where there's a piece of it that perhaps at the MP student could take so.

I think Penn Nursing is is.

Leaning more now towards having an integration about the NPM PhD prepared faculty.

Yes, the sessions recorded and you can access it later.

Um have previous DNP students ever transferred to the PhD program. You mean if you mean here at Penn Nursing. I don't think so.

OK, No.

We had our first DNP cowork graduate last year that was our our anesthesia students and there were 15 students who walked in graduation, they were all hooded.

By their faculty mentors this year, there will be.

Anesthesia and postmaster students and moving forward that will always be the case and eventually as I mentioned earlier when we open our executive leadership track. We will have executive leadership graduates as well.

The cost the estimated cost. We were actually talking about this today at a meeting is roughly and please. Don't quote me on this, but roughly about 68,000 per year and that is inclusive of tuition and the intensive.

Message S that you always check our website for the latest tuition information. You can go to our nursing website under financial aid and you'll get the most up-to-date to wish it.

OK, well if no one has any more questions, we will.

Closeout this session on this is the contact information. As always any admissions inquiries can be sent to our admissions, email and then we also have the emails for RDNP team. Thank you everyone for joining us. Thank you too. Sue and Kate and Lizzy for leading the session. This presentation will be emailed to you in about 2 days so thank you.