Best DNP Programs

Scranton-Wilkes-Barre metro

Best DNP Programs In Scranton-Wilkes-Barre 2026

3 accredited institutions in the Scranton-Wilkes-Barre metro, with school-wide average graduate tuition from $11,580 to $36,650 a year in state.
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Key Takeaways

  1. 1

    3 accredited institutions, drawn from 3 municipalities. This guide counts the Scranton--Wilkes-Barre, PA metropolitan area rather than the city limits, so the pool is wider than the city name suggests and every campus in it is inside one commute.

  2. 2

    Every institution here is private. No public option means residency buys you nothing in this metro. A private institution charges one rate wherever you live, so an out-of-state applicant is on the same terms as a local one.

  3. 3

    Output is concentrated in one school. Wilkes University conferred 23 of the 35 DNP awards recorded across this metro, with Misericordia University next at 11. A number that lopsided says where the cohorts and the placement relationships are, which a ranking position does not.

  4. 4

    1 of 3 reach you at a distance. That many carry the federal distance-education flag, which covers taught content and never the supervised practice hours. Ask for the number of on-campus days and the months they fall in.

No Public Option, And The Field Is Really Two Schools

School-wide average graduate tuition in this metro, which excludes DNP add-on charges, runs from $11,580 a year in state at University of Scranton to $36,650 at Misericordia University, about 3 times apart, in the 2023-24 federal figures.

All three priced institutions are private, and each charges the same rate whatever your residency, so moving here or not does not change the bill.

Wilkes University conferred the most DNPs in the metro in the reporting year, 23, and sits between the two ends of the price range.

These are average tuition figures for full-time graduate students across each institution, not a DNP price. Some doctoral programs add a tuition differential on top, so ask each school for its DNP rate per credit before comparing.

How This Ranking Is Scored

Three published figures, weighted. Scores are relative to the 3 institutions on this page and to nothing else.

  1. 50%

    Published in-state graduate tuition

    Institution-level. Average annual tuition for full-time graduate students, 2023-24, from IPEDS. Not a DNP per-credit rate, not including program differentials, and not net of aid.

  2. 35%

    Established program

    Program-level. DNP conferrals in this CIP and award level in the reporting year, saturating at 25. Above that a program scores full marks and gains nothing further for size.

  3. 15%

    Institution-wide undergraduate completion

    Institution-level and undergraduate. The IPEDS 150%-of-normal-time rate for first-time, full-time bachelor's students.

Nothing is imputed. A program that does not publish a figure is scored on the ones it does publish, with the remaining weights renormalized; below 2 published figures it is listed without a position rather than ranked on a single number. Accreditation is a condition of appearing at all, not a factor that earns points. What the rubric cannot see.

The Best 3 DNP Programs In Scranton-Wilkes-Barre, Ranked

Ordered on the same three published figures the state guides use: in-state tuition, annual conferrals and completion rate. One row per institution, not per federal filing.

Each card shows what the institution publishes.

Ranked 1 of 3

University of Scranton

Scranton, PA

65 of 100
  • CCNE-accredited
  • Private nonprofit
  • Professional practice doctorate

Scranton runs a 30-credit post-master’+A+’s leadership DNP at $772 per credit, which is one of the few programs on this site to publish a per-credit rate rather than an annual figure, and it makes the arithmetic straightforward. The format is executive: online coursework built on the assumption that you are practicing full-time while you study, which is a design choice rather than a concession. All students complete a minimum of 1,000 clinical hours toward the capstone, and advanced practice students are credited for hours already completed in a master’+A+’s specialty. The framing is Jesuit, with the emphasis on ethical leadership and service alongside the clinical content.

Tuition
$11,580
In-state
Tuition
$11,580
Out-of-state
DNP Awards
1
Completion
80%
Undergraduate
About the tuition figures
School-wide graduate average, 2023-24. Excludes DNP add-on charges.

Scored on

  • Published in-state graduate tuition 100
  • Established program 0
  • Institution-wide undergraduate completion 100

Visit University of Scranton →

Ranked 2 of 3

Wilkes University

Wilkes-Barre, PA

60.2 of 100
  • CCNE-accredited
  • Private nonprofit
  • Professional practice doctorate
  • Offered online

Wilkes runs its post-master’s doctorate online and mostly asynchronously, and it counts indirect clinical hours toward the total, which matters if your work is systems and leadership rather than direct patient care. How many hours you owe depends on what your master’s already covered, so the number gets settled against your transcript instead of being published as one figure. The catalog also carries a course whose stated purpose is giving students more time to finish the required 1,000 hours. That is a quiet admission that the hours are where people run long, and it is more useful than a completion estimate. If you are here to move into a leadership role rather than a new clinical population, the shape fits that.

Tuition
$24,000
In-state
Tuition
$24,000
Out-of-state
DNP Awards
23
Completion
63%
Undergraduate
About the tuition figures
School-wide graduate average, 2023-24. Excludes DNP add-on charges.

Scored on

  • Published in-state graduate tuition 50.5
  • Established program 100
  • Institution-wide undergraduate completion 0

Visit Wilkes University →

Ranked 3 of 3

Misericordia University

Dallas, PA

33.2 of 100
  • CCNE-accredited
  • Private nonprofit
  • Professional practice doctorate

Misericordia has taught nursing for more than 75 years and carries Commission on Collegiate Nursing Education accreditation across the bachelor’s, master’s, post-graduate advanced practice certificate and the doctorate. Against a student body of a few thousand, its doctoral output sits in the top quarter of accredited institutions nationally, which is more than a university this size usually manages and suggests the program is a priority rather than an afterthought. The doctorate carries no distance flag in its federal filing, so plan on being in Dallas, Pennsylvania. The university also publishes merit and need-based aid that can exceed twenty thousand dollars a year for students who qualify.

Tuition
$36,650
In-state
Tuition
$36,650
Out-of-state
DNP Awards
11
Completion
72%
Undergraduate
About the tuition figures
School-wide graduate average, 2023-24. Excludes DNP add-on charges.

Scored on

  • Published in-state graduate tuition 0
  • Established program 72.1
  • Institution-wide undergraduate completion 52.9

Visit Misericordia University →

What This Guide Counts As The Scranton-Wilkes-Barre Metro

This guide follows the Scranton--Wilkes-Barre metropolitan statistical area in north-eastern Pennsylvania. Misericordia University is in Dallas, Pennsylvania, a small borough in Luzerne County about twenty minutes from Wilkes-Barre and not to be confused with the Texas city of the same name. Wilkes University is in Wilkes-Barre and the University of Scranton is about twenty minutes north.

Municipalities Included

  • Scranton, PA
  • Wilkes-Barre, PA
  • Dallas, PA

Deliberately Not Included

  • Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, PA The two large Pennsylvania metros, each with its own guide.
  • Center Valley, PA The Allentown-Bethlehem-Easton metro, about an hour south and separately delineated.
  • Dallas, TX A different Dallas. This metro’s Dallas is a Luzerne County borough of about two thousand people, and it is where Misericordia University sits. The dataset is matched on city AND state for exactly this reason.

Choosing A DNP Program In Scranton-Wilkes-Barre

What studying in the Scranton-Wilkes-Barre metro changes. The questions that apply wherever you study are on the national ranking page.

A field of 3 is small enough to contact all of it

Misericordia University, University of Scranton and Wilkes University are the accredited doctorates in the Scranton-Wilkes-Barre metro, which is few enough that writing to every one of them is a morning's work rather than a project. It is also the fastest way to learn what no program page prints: who secures your clinical placement, what the school charges if a doctoral project runs past its term, and which tracks are open to new applicants this cycle. Against a field this size, a reply beats a rubric.

The Pennsylvania board of nursing decides the license, not the diploma

No doctorate confers authority to practice or prescribe. That authority comes from an advanced practice license the state issues and the national certification behind it, which is why a DNP-prepared and a master's-prepared nurse practitioner on the same license prescribe the same things. What varies between states is the licensure requirement itself, so take it from the board rather than from a program page, and take it early: several programs want an active license in the state where your practicum will happen rather than wherever you hold one now, and licensure by endorsement runs to months. What the degree does and does not grant sets out the distinction.

Wilkes University carries the distance flag

1 of the 3 measured institutions in the Scranton-Wilkes-Barre metro carry it. That flag records only that taught content can be delivered at a distance. It says nothing about campus days, and nothing about the supervised practice hours, which happen in a building with a preceptor present wherever you enroll. Ask for the number of on-campus days and the months they fall in, because that is what you hold against a roster. Online DNP programs ranks the distance-flagged field nationally.

Every measured program here is private, so residency buys you nothing

All 3 measured institutions in the Scranton-Wilkes-Barre metro are private, and a private institution charges one rate regardless of where you live. That removes the largest variable on most state pages: moving, or establishing residency, changes nothing about what you pay here. Compare instead on the published rate, on who arranges your clinical placement, and on what the school charges when a doctoral project runs past its scheduled term.

A metro is a commute, and Pennsylvania is the field

This page covers the institutions inside the Scranton-Wilkes-Barre area because a campus you can reach on a weekday is a different proposition from one you cannot. It is a narrower field than the one you are actually choosing from: DNP programs in Pennsylvania carries every accredited institution in the state, and for a program you would attend at a distance the metro boundary means nothing at all.

Who Licenses You In The Scranton-Wilkes-Barre Metro

Practice environment from AANP’s own state fact sheets, read 2026-09-08; AANP last revised the classification 05/2026. Boards from the NCSBN member directory, read 2026-09-08.

Pennsylvania
Reduced Practice
Pennsylvania State Board of Nursing

Every institution on this page sits in Pennsylvania, so one board licenses all of them and AANP classifies the jurisdiction as reduced practice. The school does not grant practice authority and never has; the license and the certification behind it do.

The board detail, the full AANP definition and the license verification route are on the state guide: DNP programs in Pennsylvania . AANP is reading state statute rather than issuing a federal designation, and statutes move each legislative session, so confirm with the board before you rely on it.

What The Work Pays In The Scranton-Wilkes-Barre Metro

BLS OEWS, May 2025, metropolitan area cut for Scranton--Wilkes-Barre, PA, read 2026-09-10. BLS classifies by occupation, not by credential: there is no DNP wage series, and every figure here covers everyone in the occupation regardless of which degree they hold.

OccupationMedian, Scranton-Wilkes-Barre metroEmployedNational median
Nurse Practitioners29-1171$126,820430$132,300
Nurse Anesthetists29-1151$199,800—$236,590
Registered Nurses29-1141$82,6505,400$97,550
Nursing Instructors and Teachers, Postsecondary25-1072$76,710170$80,250

Nurse practitioners in the Scranton-Wilkes-Barre metro have a median of $126,820, across about 430 of them, $5,480 below the national $132,300.

A median is the midpoint of what people in the occupation are paid, so half earn less and half earn more; it is not a starting salary and not an offer. The metropolitan cut is a different survey area from the state one, so these figures will not reconcile with the state page and are not meant to. How BLS defines these areas .

Shortage Areas, And The Debt Relief Attached To Them

HRSA designated primary-care Health Professional Shortage Areas, read 2026-09-08. These are state counts, not metro ones.

Pennsylvania, designated areas
132
Pennsylvania, of those rural
70

These figures cover Pennsylvania in full rather than the Scranton-Wilkes-Barre metro specifically. HRSA publishes designations at the level of the individual area, and rolling them into a metro needs a county crosswalk this guide does not hold, so the state count is what is shown and it is shown as a state count. What follows from it still applies here, because eligibility never attached to a jurisdiction in the first place.

Both federal loan repayment routes open to advanced practice nurses require working at an approved site inside a designated area, and the area’s score sets funding priority when applications outrun the money: Nurse Corps Loan Repayment Program and NHSC Loan Repayment Program. HPSA primary-care scores run 0-25; funding priority for loan repayment follows the score.

In a metro that is mostly urban the practical consequence is that eligible sites are a smaller share of the employers you are likely to interview with than the state count suggests, and they are usually federally qualified health centers, public hospital systems and university clinics rather than private practices. Whether a particular employer counts is settled by the program rather than by the designation, so check the site before you take the job.

HRSA’s shortage-area data portal maps the designations to the address. Paying for a DNP covers the routes that do not depend on where you practice, and the state guide breaks the designations down further: Pennsylvania.

Studying From Outside The Scranton-Wilkes-Barre Metro

1 of the 3 accredited doctorates in the Scranton-Wilkes-Barre metro carry the federal distance-education flag, which leaves most of the local field expecting you in the room and makes an out-of-state program a real comparison rather than a fallback. Either way it turns on one thing this site cannot answer for you.

Authority to enroll a distance student is set per institution and per state, and the federal flag this page counts records delivery rather than permission, so only the school can answer it. Ask two things before tuition enters the conversation: whether the program can enroll a resident of the Scranton-Wilkes-Barre metro this cycle, and whether it will place you for supervised clinical hours near where you live.

Which Scranton-Wilkes-Barre Option Fits Your Situation

Each of these routes to a published figure or a named institution. None is a recommendation, and none is a statement about whether a school will admit you.

If you hold a bachelor's: Wilkes University states that route

Wilkes University's own pages name a bachelor's entry. Others in Scranton-Wilkes-Barre may take bachelor's entrants too: this site records a route only where the school states it, so an absent name means unread rather than closed.

If you already hold an advanced practice credential: University of Scranton

University of Scranton publishes a post-master's route, the shorter way in when your master's already carries supervised hours. Ask how many transfer; the ceilings differ sharply.

If you cannot relocate: Wilkes University

Wilkes University carries the federal distance-education flag. The flag covers taught content only. Supervised hours still happen near you, and campus days are the school's to set, so ask for the count and the months.

If residency is out of reach: the private rate does not depend on it

A private institution charges one figure wherever you live, so without residency the comparison is against the out-of-state public rate. In Scranton-Wilkes-Barre the cheapest published rate in the state belongs to one of its 3 private institutions.

What The Figures On This Page Are

Tuition is the institution’s published annual graduate rate, not a per-credit price and not a program total. Awards are conferrals in the reporting year. Completion is the federal undergraduate rate, the weakest input in the model, and no federal series reports DNP completion. Wages are the metropolitan cut of the federal survey, a different survey area from the state one. How this site scores programs sets out each input and its weight in full.

Frequently Asked Questions

How many DNP programs are there in Scranton-Wilkes-Barre?

3 institutions in the Scranton-Wilkes-Barre metro hold CCNE accreditation for the Doctor of Nursing Practice. This guide counts the Scranton--Wilkes-Barre, PA metropolitan statistical area rather than the city limits, so the figure includes institutions in 3 municipalities.

What counts as the Scranton-Wilkes-Barre metro on this page?

The Scranton--Wilkes-Barre, PA metropolitan statistical area. In practice that means these municipalities: Scranton, PA; Wilkes-Barre, PA; Dallas, PA. Places deliberately left out are listed on this page with the reason.

Is it cheaper to study for a DNP in Scranton-Wilkes-Barre than online?

Neither is reliably cheaper. Published in-state tuition at a public institution is usually the lowest figure available to someone who qualifies for it, and distance programs charge a single rate to everyone regardless of where they live. Which comes out lower depends entirely on whether you hold in-state status somewhere, so compare the published rates rather than the format.

Do these figures include fees and clinical costs?

No. Every tuition figure on this page is the published rate an institution reports to the federal government, which excludes fees, health insurance, textbooks and the travel a clinical placement can require. Treat it as a floor for comparison between institutions rather than a total cost of attendance.

Related Pages

Sources

  1. 1 CCNE Directory Of Accredited Programs Which institutions hold accreditation.
  2. 2 IPEDS Published tuition, conferrals and completion.
  3. 3 Metro Definition The Scranton--Wilkes-Barre, PA metropolitan statistical area, rolled up to the municipalities listed above. Institutions are matched on city and state.

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.

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