Best DNP Programs

DNP Programs By City

Thirteen metropolitan areas have four or more CCNE-accredited Doctor of Nursing Practice programs, which is enough to compare as a shortlist rather than a list. Together they hold 79 accredited institutions.

Every Metro With A Guide

Ordered by how many accredited institutions each one holds. Each guide counts the census metropolitan area rather than the city limits, and says which municipalities that includes.

  • Philadelphia

    11 accredited institutions

    4 public · $7,716 to $66,838 in-state · NP median $135,700

    Crosses Pennsylvania and New Jersey and Delaware, and practice authority changes with it

  • Chicago

    9 accredited institutions

    1 public · $12,789 to $52,230 in-state · NP median $131,740

    Crosses Illinois and Indiana

  • New York City

    8 accredited institutions

    2 public · $7,070 to $62,796 in-state · NP median $163,340

    Crosses New York and New Jersey, and practice authority changes with it

  • Los Angeles

    7 accredited institutions

    4 public · $6,084 to $43,758 in-state · NP median $161,470

  • Boston

    6 accredited institutions

    2 public · $15,278 to $85,000 in-state · NP median $147,480

  • Pittsburgh

    6 accredited institutions

    1 public · $7,716 to $48,986 in-state · NP median $119,630

  • Miami

    6 accredited institutions

    2 public · $2,522 to $60,720 in-state · NP median $131,340

  • Dallas-Fort Worth

    5 accredited institutions

    2 public · $5,712 to $61,650 in-state · NP median $130,980

  • Houston

    5 accredited institutions

    4 public · $7,387 to $33,784 in-state · NP median $134,560

  • Detroit

    4 accredited institutions

    2 public · $14,274 to $32,946 in-state · NP median $134,390

  • St. Louis

    4 accredited institutions

    2 public · $8,918 to $54,760 in-state · NP median $131,580

    Crosses Missouri and Illinois, and practice authority changes with it

  • Washington DC

    4 accredited institutions

    1 public · $10,392 to $67,420 in-state · NP median $134,840

    Crosses District of Columbia and Virginia, and practice authority changes with it

  • Milwaukee

    4 accredited institutions

    1 public · $8,772 to $50,070 in-state · NP median $134,350

Why These Thirteen And Not Fifty

A metro guide is worth writing when it can put a real shortlist in front of a reader, and that takes about four accredited institutions. Below that the page is a list of one or two schools wearing a city's name, and the state guide already does that job better. Atlanta has one accredited doctorate. Nashville has two. Baltimore, Minneapolis and Phoenix have three each, and none of them has a page here for that reason rather than because of their size.

The thirteen below are the ones that clear it once a real metropolitan definition is applied rather than the city limits. That distinction does most of the work: New York City itself holds two accredited doctorates, and the metropolitan area holds eight, spread across Nassau, Rockland and Suffolk counties and three counties in New Jersey.

5 of the 13 cross a state line, and 4 of those change what a nurse practitioner license permits when they do. That is the fact a city name hides and the reason these pages exist as more than a convenience.

If Your City Is Not Here

Start with the state guide rather than the nearest metro. Every jurisdiction has one, they carry every accredited institution in the state rather than only those inside a metropolitan boundary, and for a program you would attend at a distance the boundary means nothing at all. DNP programs by state lists all 52.

And it is worth questioning the premise, because for a practice doctorate proximity to a campus is usually the wrong constraint. What has to be near you is the SUPERVISED PRACTICE: a thousand post-baccalaureate hours served with a preceptor in a real clinic, which happens where you live rather than where the school is. Taught content increasingly reaches you anywhere. So the question that decides most of these is not which campus you can drive to, it is whether a program will place you near home, and that is answered by the school rather than by any ranking.

Online DNP programs ranks the distance-flagged field nationally, and the A-to-Z directory lists every accredited institution on the site regardless of where it sits.

Sources

  1. 1 CCNE accredited program directory Which institutions hold accreditation for the doctorate, and therefore which metros have a field worth comparing.
  2. 2 IPEDS Published tuition and the city each institution reports, which is what places it inside a metro.
  3. 3 BLS Occupational Employment And Wage Statistics, Metropolitan Area Cut The nurse practitioner median for each metro. A different survey area from the state figures, so the two do not reconcile and are not meant to.
  4. 4 AANP State Practice Environment Which metros change practice authority across a state line.

Every federal figure on this site is read from the administering agency’s own page, never from a secondary aggregator, and the reading date is recorded beside it.