College of Education and Behavioral Sciences News

What if you already had a bachelor’s degree but decided you wanted to go into nursing and could make it happen in two calendar years?

WKU is offering an accelerated nursing program as WKU’s Amy Bingham explains in this week’s View from the Hill.

The MEPN program, Master Entry Professional Nursing, launched at WKU in the spring of 2019. It’s perfect for anyone seeking a rewarding career change.

“Once I got into the MEPN program and I realized really what I was becoming a part of, it changed my life.”

This 2019 alum of WKU already had two bachelor’s degrees and was working as a Health Care Coordinator when she realized the struggle with health literacy in the community.

“I was calling people and telling them that their procedures had been approved by their insurance company and they were asking me intense questions about what their procedure was about.”

Wanting to do more to educate people, a past professor sent her the application for WKU’s newly launched MEPN program.

“I looked at it and I said going back to school for two more years, that’s insane.  I’ll never do that.”

But now two years later, Amy is on the verge of receiving both a bachelor’s and master’s in nursing.

“This program was designed with her in mind.  I mean the person like her.”

Coordinator Tonya Bragg-Underwood says the program is attracting people with a wide range of bachelor’s degrees. 

“The most common are exercise science, biology and psychology which are all three excellent fits.  That former bachelor’s degree and that former workplace experience, it brings a wealth of information and knowledge to them as an RN and to their employer.”

Not only is the work experience priceless, Bragg-Underwood says so is WKU’s state of the art facility.

“We have the high-fidelity mannequins that run simulations, that are very realistic.”

Amy says she couldn’t be happier with her decision to relaunch her career.

“I just think it’s important for people to know that if you graduate from college and you get a career and it’s not what you want, that it’s OK to start over.”

Amy plans to pursue her doctorate and become a nurse practitioner. There are 26 students in the program but it’s equipped to handle 40 per year.

To learn more about the MEPN program, visit https://www.wku.edu/nursing/mepn.php