How our preceptor matching works for Herzing NP students

Our whole job is to make sure you have a qualified, Herzing-approvable preceptor lined up before your clinical deadline arrives, so you never have to gamble on a last-minute scramble. Here is the entire process at a glance:

• Step 1 — You tell us the basics. Your NP track, the city or county you can drive to, and your clinical application deadline. We map your practicum window from there.
• Step 2 — We source your preceptor. We find a qualified clinician in your specialty and area, aim for a site Herzing can approve, and gather the documents Herzing's clinical application requires — the preceptor's CV and a signed preceptor agreement.
• Step 3 — You start on schedule. With approvable paperwork in hand ahead of your deadline, you submit through Herzing's normal process and begin your rotation on time.

We are an independent placement service. We are not Herzing University and we do not speak for Herzing or the CCNE — everything we line up still goes through Herzing's own approval channels. What we add is early, hands-on legwork so you clear those channels comfortably.

The first conversation is short. We need three things to start working for you.

• Your NP track. FNP, AGACNP, AGPCNP, PMHNP, PNP-PC, or WHNP — at the MSN level, as a post-master's APRN certificate, or as part of a BSN-to-DNP or MSN-to-DNP. The track determines the kind of clinician and setting your hours have to come from.
• Where you can do clinicals. Your city or county, and realistically how far you are willing to drive. Local matters: preceptors prefer students they can supervise in person, and Herzing approves sites, not just people.
• Your clinical application deadline. The single most important date. Herzing's own placement support is deadline-gated, so the earlier we know your deadline, the more runway we have to deliver an approvable preceptor before it.

From there we map your practicum to the hours commonly published for your program — we always confirm the exact requirement against your current Herzing handbook rather than assume — and we sketch the timeline backward from your deadline. The specialty-by-specialty hour figures and the day-by-day timeline live on dedicated pages so they stay accurate: see clinical hours by track and clinical deadlines.

This is the work you came to us for. Once we know your track, area, and deadline, we go find a real clinician who fits.

• We match the specialty. A PMHNP student needs a psychiatric preceptor; an AGACNP student needs an acute-care setting. We look for a preceptor whose credentials and practice line up with your track so the placement holds up under Herzing's review.
• We aim for a site Herzing can approve. Herzing requires that both the preceptor and the site meet its standards. We target clinicians and locations that are realistically approvable and build the case for approval, rather than handing you a name and wishing you luck.
• We gather the documents. Herzing's clinical application needs the preceptor's CV and a signed preceptor agreement. We collect both as part of sourcing, so when it is time to submit, your packet is complete.

One honest note about scope: we line up an approvable preceptor and site. The final approval decision is always Herzing's, and it always runs through Herzing's clinical team. We do not promise to override their judgment — we work to make sure there is nothing left for them to object to. The background check, immunization clearance, and other paperwork that go alongside the application are covered on our clinical compliance page.

The point of starting early is simple: you submit a complete, approvable clinical application well within Herzing's window, Herzing approves it through its normal process, and you begin your rotation when your program calendar says you should — not a semester late because a site fell through.

Missing a clinical deadline is the costly failure mode in any NP program; it can push graduation back by months. Our entire process is built to retire that risk before it can happen. When step 3 arrives, the heavy lifting is already done. For how the deadline math works and when to start counting backward, see clinical deadlines.

Herzing is student-first by design. Students are expressly encouraged to take an active role in identifying and securing their own clinical site and preceptor, and Herzing supports that with a Clinical Placement Advisor for guidance and a master's-prepared Clinical Coordinator for coaching and additional site leads. There is also an approved-site fallback list if your own outreach comes up empty.

We do not replace any of that — we strengthen it. Think of us as extra capacity for the part Herzing puts on you: the actual outreach and sourcing. You keep your Herzing advisor and coordinator, follow Herzing's Clinical Guidance Process, and submit through Herzing's system. We simply make sure you walk into those conversations with a qualified preceptor and a complete packet already in hand.

Herzing also offers its APRN Clinical Placement Pledge — a real promise that the school will step in and secure a placement if you cannot, but only after you have followed every required step and started early enough. It is conditional, reactive, and deadline-gated, which is exactly the gap we close: we get an approvable preceptor in place early, so you clear Herzing's requirements comfortably instead of testing whether the Pledge's conditions are met. The full breakdown of the Pledge and its conditions lives on our clinical placement page.

Our service is the early sourcing, matching, and document-gathering described above — independent of Herzing, paid for by you, and focused on one outcome: an approvable preceptor before your deadline. You can see what we do and how we are priced on our services and cost pages.

To start, send us your track, your city, and your clinical application deadline through our contact form or by message. The sooner we have those three things, the more runway we have to get you placed on time.