All students admitted to Binghamton University are required to meet the University-wide comprehensive general education curriculum, with the exception of transfer students with an associate's degree in any discipline, or with 57 completed transfer credits. Requirements for the BS degree in nursing include four courses in the humanities, three courses in the social sciences, and ten elective credits. Most of the courses that meet the General Education requirements also fulfill prerequisite courses which must be taken before beginning the upper division nursing courses in the junior year. All courses must be taken for at least three credits. It is expected that anatomy, chemistry, microbiology, and physiology include a laboratory component.
Students begin the nursing major in the junior year.
Most of the nursing courses have a clinical component, which provides students with the opportunity to apply theory to practice. In the final semester of the senior year, students transition to practice as professional nurses through immersion in clinical experiences in practice settings in area hospitals, primary care, and other health organizations. Students also choose from a number of two-credit nursing electives which enable them to study areas of particular interest within health care, such as holistic health, play and the hospitalized child, professional ethics, nutrition, sociocultural aspects of health care, computers in health care, and health problems of the aging. Curriculum Plan Transfer students who enter the nursing program with a baccalaureate degree in another field must complete the prerequisites listed above and 52 credits in upper-division nursing courses. The two-year program plan for students with a baccalaureate or higher degree in another field consists of 52 credits of nursing course work.