Best DNP Programs

Toledo metro

Best DNP Programs In Toledo 2026

Two accredited institutions eight miles apart that conferred three doctorates between them in the reporting year, the smallest output of any metro on this site.
A downtown skyline seen flat across a wide river in daylight, a dark glass tower at the left and lower brick and stone blocks along the waterfront

"Toledo, Ohio Skyline, July 2022" by MrJacon000, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: commons.wikimedia.org

On this page

Key Takeaways

  1. 1

    Price will not narrow this list. The published in-state rates here sit inside a band of roughly 1.1 times, which is tight for a metro. That pushes the decision onto track, cohort size and who arranges the clinical placement.

  2. 2

    1 public, 1 private, and the cheap end is public. University of Toledo publishes $15,354 in-state, against $16,576 at the next option up. Residency is the lever here, and that figure is one school's published year rather than a typical cost: it leaves out fees, insurance and what reaching a clinical placement costs.

  3. 3

    Output is concentrated in one school. Lourdes University conferred 2 of the 4 DNP awards recorded across this metro, with University of Toledo next at 2. A number that lopsided says where the cohorts and the placement relationships are, which a ranking position does not.

  4. 4

    1 of 2 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.

Three Doctorates In A Year, Across A Metro Of Six Hundred Thousand

School-wide average graduate tuition in this metro, which excludes DNP add-on charges, runs from $15,354 a year in state at University of Toledo to $16,576 at Lourdes University, within a quarter of each other, in the 2023-24 federal figures.

The one public institution publishes $15,354 in state, and the one private institution publishes $16,576. Out of state, the public rate rises to $26,943.

University of Toledo conferred the most DNPs in the metro in the reporting year, 2, and charges the lowest graduate rate here.

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.

The University of Toledo conferred 1 DNP award in the reporting year and Lourdes University conferred 2. Three is the lowest combined output of any metro guide on this site, and it is the single most important thing to understand about this page before reading the ranking.

It is one year of one survey and it is not a verdict on either program. What it does mean is that a reader cannot infer cohort size, admission frequency or whether a given track is currently running from anything here, and should ask both schools directly. A metro this size producing three doctorates is a signal to make phone calls rather than to draw conclusions.

How This Ranking Is Scored

Three published figures, weighted. Scores are relative to the 2 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 2 DNP Programs In Toledo, 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 2

University of Toledo

Toledo, OH

100 of 100
  • CCNE-accredited
  • Public
  • Professional practice doctorate
  • Offered online

2 DNP tracks at this institution, Nursing administration, Psychiatric-mental health NP. Ranked once, on the largest.

Toledo splits its DNP by how much of it you can do from home. The nurse executive and nurse leadership pathways are delivered entirely online. The nurse practitioner tracks are not: they combine online coursework with required in-person clinical experiences and on-campus skills immersion days the college strongly recommends rather than mandates, so the honest planning assumption is that you will be traveling. Nurse anesthesia is a different scale again at 97 credits. One admission rule catches people out: coursework more than seven years old at the point you apply will not count, so a master’s you finished a decade ago may not carry across the way you expect.

Tuition
$15,354
In-state
Tuition
$26,943
Out-of-state
DNP Awards
2
Completion
57%
Undergraduate
About the tuition figures
School-wide graduate average, 2023-24. Excludes DNP add-on charges.

Scored on

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

Visit University of Toledo →

Ranked 2 of 2

Lourdes University

Sylvania, OH

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

Lourdes builds its 37-credit DNP out of four named parts rather than one course list: online asynchronous coursework, experiential learning, the DNP project, and a competency validation stage. That last one is the unusual piece. Most programs treat the project as the terminal hurdle, whereas here there is a separate demonstration that you can do the thing before you finish. It is a small private university of under a thousand students in northwest Ohio conferring a handful of doctorates a year, so the cohort is small and the asynchronous format is what makes the reach wider than the campus. Its federal filing carries no distance-education flag for the degree.

Tuition
$16,576
In-state
Tuition
$16,576
Out-of-state
DNP Awards
2
Completion
32%
Undergraduate
About the tuition figures
School-wide graduate average, 2023-24. Excludes DNP add-on charges.

Scored on

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

Visit Lourdes University →

What This Guide Counts As The Toledo Metro

This guide follows the Toledo, OH metropolitan statistical area. Both institutions are inside it: the University of Toledo in the city and Lourdes University in Sylvania, an adjacent suburb. Detroit and Ann Arbor are across the Michigan line and in separate metropolitan areas, which matters here because both are close enough to commute to and neither is on this page.

Municipalities Included

  • Toledo, OH
  • Sylvania, OH

Deliberately Not Included

  • Detroit and Ann Arbor, MI Separate metropolitan areas across the state line to the north. Detroit has its own guide and is under an hour away, which makes it a realistic alternative from here.
  • Bowling Green, OH Its own micropolitan area about twenty miles south.
  • The Michigan side of the region The Toledo metropolitan area is wholly within Ohio, so unlike several guides here no state line runs through this list.

Choosing A DNP Program In Toledo

What studying in the Toledo metro changes. The questions that apply wherever you study are on the national ranking page.

Lourdes University and University of Toledo are the whole of the field in Toledo

Lourdes University and University of Toledo file their conferrals under a specialty classification rather than under Nursing Practice, so the credit total, the entry routes and the clinical hour requirement live on their own pages rather than in the federal columns this page ranks on. Ask them who arranges clinical placements, and take the licensure question to the Ohio board of nursing rather than to the school.

Who Licenses You In The Toledo 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.

Ohio
Reduced Practice
Ohio Board of Nursing

Every institution on this page sits in Ohio, 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 Ohio . 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.

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.

Ohio, designated areas
209
Ohio, of those rural
81

These figures cover Ohio in full rather than the Toledo 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: Ohio.

Studying From Outside The Toledo Metro

1 of the 2 accredited doctorates in the Toledo 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 Toledo metro this cycle, and whether it will place you for supervised clinical hours near where you live.

Which Toledo 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 the published price is what decides it: University of Toledo

The lowest published in-state rate among Toledo's publics, at $15,354 a year. An annual rate, not a program total, and it assumes residency.

If you are moving to Toledo: settle residency before you apply

University of Toledo publishes a $11,589 annual gap between its in-state and out-of-state rates, the widest of the 1 Toledo public publishing both. Start with the registrar, not admissions.

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

Lourdes University's own pages name a bachelor's entry. Others in Toledo 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: Lourdes University

Lourdes University 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: University of Toledo

University of Toledo 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.

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 Toledo?

2 institutions in the Toledo metro hold CCNE accreditation for the Doctor of Nursing Practice. This guide counts the Toledo, OH metropolitan statistical area rather than the city limits, so the figure includes institutions in 2 municipalities.

What counts as the Toledo metro on this page?

The Toledo, OH metropolitan statistical area. In practice that means these municipalities: Toledo, OH; Sylvania, OH. Places deliberately left out are listed on this page with the reason.

Is it cheaper to study for a DNP in Toledo 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 Toledo, OH 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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Schools pay to appear in these listings. They are separate from our rankings, which no school can pay to change.