Post-Master's Certificate in Nursing Education

Already have your MSN degree? This certificate will prepare you to become a leader in nursing education.

Xavier’s online Post-Master’s Certificate in Nursing Education provides experienced nurses with advanced-level preparation in the principles of education. At the completion of this 10-credit-hour certificate program, you’ll be prepared to use your deep expertise to assume professional leadership roles as a nurse educator, consultant, staff educator, clinical nursing faculty and continuing education provider. 

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Why Xavier Online?

You’ll get more from your online education, from the personal attention of faculty to rigorous courses taught in the Jesuit Catholic tradition.

Personalized Experience

You’ll get the personal attention and flexibility needed to reach your goals at your pace. Our invested professors and small class sizes will set you up for success.

Jesuit Values

Our Jesuit Catholic values are based on a vision of a world changed for the better, emphasizing service and community engagement in addition to academics.

Affordability

We offer exceptional online programs at an affordable cost. Numerous financial aid resources are available for our online students, making education more affordable.

Curriculum

Post Master's Certificate in Nursing Education

10 credits

Xavier’s online Post Master’s Certificate in Nursing Education is a 10-credit program that consists of 4 education-focused courses that can be taken on your schedule

This course provides a framework for facilitating learning and understanding the adult learner within academia and the healthcare environment. It explores theoretical foundations, principles for teaching/learning, factors that impact readiness to learn, tips for on-line teaching, and how to create learning objectives.

This course provides the student with information concerning the selection and utilization of pertinent teaching strategies that can be used wtih adult learners pursuing knowledge within the healthcare environment. The student will obtain knowledge concerning how these teaching strategies can be used in this endeavor as well as the advantages and disadvantages of each. Selection of appropriate teaching strategies will be explored in relationship to learning styles and information to be presented. Evaluation means to ascertain the effectiveness of each strategy will also be presented.

This course provides the student with necessary information needed to pursue the nurse educator role. After completion of this course, the student will be able to function as either an academic nursing faculty member or a corporate/staff nurse educator. Roles and responsibilities of nurse educators will be addressed. These responsibilities include teaching; service; scholarship; curriculum planning; curriculum/educational offering development; maintaining records; mentoring; student advising; student accommodation; application for continuing education; implementing and educational offering/didactic content; test development; and evaluation of educational offerings, students/staff, courses, and programs.

This course is designed for application of theory and principles from all previous courses, with particular emphasis in education. Individually modified course objectives, supervised experiences, periodic seminar discussions, and written practicum logs are methods used to facilitate the learning experience.

Admission

Our admission process is easy, on your phone or computer!

Applicants to the Post-Master’s Certificate in Nursing Education must meet the following requirements:

  • Be a registered nurse with an unencumbered United States RN license in the state where practicum experiences are to be completed. A minimum of 1 year of nursing experience is required, a strong candidate will have a minimum of 2 years of nursing experience.
  • • Hold a BSN and a be a graduate of an accredited college or university’s nursing program (the College of Nursing will verify accreditation to ensure it meets requirements). Transfer credits are accepted only from regionally accredited institutions.
  • Strong candidates will also possess a minimum 3.0 GPA.

To be considered for admission, students must submit the following:

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One official transcript directly from all colleges or universities that you have attended for any undergraduate and graduate course work. Applicants must have a degree from a regionally accredited university. A strong candidate will have a minimum of a 3.0 GPA. Send transcripts to:

Xavier University
ATTN: Admission Processing Center
3800 Victory Parkway
Cincinnati, OH 45207-5131

For electronic transcripts, send to:
xugrad@xavier.edu

Please provide contact information for recommenders in the online application. An electronic form will be sent via email.

A strong candidate will provide:

  • At least one reference from a direct manager or supervisor who evaluates their clinical work.
  • Two references will be from someone with a masters or doctoral degree

Current résumé or curriculum vitae outlining nursing experience.

A 3-page goal statement that addresses the following points:

  • Why are you applying to Xavier University?
  • What MSN track are you applying for and why? How do you plan to use the degree and specialty?
  • What experiences have prepared you for graduate study? (or have influenced your desire to pursue graduate studies)
  • Graduate school is challenging and a large time commitment, especially with working, family, other responsibilities. What are your plans and strategies for being successful in your graduate program?
  • We also consider the writing quality of this essay. If writing is a challenge for you, also address strategies to help you in this area.

State Authorization

Xavier University is authorized to offer fully-online programs in most states. View the complete list of approved states by programs on the State Authorization page. Students must reside and complete practicum hours in approved states only.

Tuition

Get More from Your Education with a Graduate Degree from Xavier

At Xavier, we understand that no two degree programs and no two students are alike. Therefore, we structure every online degree program to address the unique needs of individual students and have created unique fee structures for each degree program, as well.
$704

Per Credit Hour

$8,448

Total Program Tuition

The amounts listed are for the 2024-2025 academic year, and include classes from Summer 2024 through Spring 2025. Tuition cost is per credit hour unless otherwise stated.
For the full, official listing, please visit xavier.edu/costs.
Xavier University reserves the right to correct any computational or clerical errors.

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Faculty

Students enrolled in Xavier’s online programs take classes with the same world-class faculty as our traditional students.

Diane Stauffer came to the Xavier University College of Nursing in 2019, but she has over 30 years of experience in nursing and over 20 years of experience in nursing education. She is a graduate of the BSN program at Ohio State University, the MSN program at the University of Cincinnati (Burn and Trauma Specialty Track), and the DNP program (Doctor of Nursing Practice) at Case Western Reserve University. Her clinical experience in nursing includes medical-surgical nursing (especially coronary care), critical care, emergency nursing, and trauma. She was employed at TriHealth for over 30 years and served in several positions including staff nurse in the emergency department, clinical nurse specialist, trauma nurse coordinator, and faculty in the Good Samaritan College of Nursing and Health Science. Prior to that she worked as a transport nurse for the Christ Hospital Mobile Care Unit, and as a staff nurse in the emergency department and in medical-surgical nursing at Ohio State University.

Dr. Stauffer was previously an active member of the local and state Emergency Nurses Association, and served as an Ohio delegate to the national assembly for seven years. She has fulfilled many leadership roles in nursing education in relation to curriculum development, program evaluation and outcomes, faculty professional development, advisory board service, policy development, and steering committees for nursing program accreditation.

Throughout her career in associate and baccalaureate education, Dr. Stauffer has taught a variety of courses including medical-surgical nursing, acute care/critical care, pathophysiology, role transition, professional issues, holistic health, nursing research, and quality improvement. At Xavier University, she has taught in the undergraduate BSN program, the MIDAS program, and the MSN program. She has also served as a faculty mentor in the DNP program and is currently the Coordinator for the Education Track in the MSN program.

Dr. Enslein EdD, MSN, RNC-OB, CNE is a Certified Nurse Educator who earned her doctoral degree from Northern Kentucky University, a MSN from Ball State University, a BSN at Wright State University, and an ADN at Miami University. Her research areas of interest are methods of promoting nursing students’ clinical judgment/reasoning, nursing informatics, infant mortality and public health nursing, and the lived experience of prelicensure nursing students. She has many years of experience as a registered nurse in the clinical setting in labor and delivery and the NICU in both Ohio and Texas. She has been in the nursing faculty role since 2012. She received the Case Competition award at the 2017 International Leadership Association annual conference in Brussels for her work in Infant Mortality. She is a member of the Beta Rho Chapter of Sigma Theta Tau International.

Dr. Wiles DNP, RN, CNL, earned a BSN at Spalding University in 1990, an MSN from Xavier University in 2008, an MEd from Xavier University in 2009, and a DNP in educational leadership from Case Western Reserve University in 2016. Previous to entering academia, she worked ten years in medical-surgical nursing and eight years in critical care. Her research area of interest is promoting nursing students’ clinical judgment to enhance patient safety and quality care through the use of various teaching strategies, including high-fidelity patient simulation.
She has many years of experience as a registered nurse in the clinical setting. She began her career at Deaconess Hospital in Cincinnati, where she spent ten years as a staff and charge nurse in oncology, neurology, and medical-surgical nursing. She spent the next eight years working at Bethesda North Hospital in the ICU/CVRU and PICC team, during which time she was ACLS and CCRN certified. During this time she was well-known as a clinical leader with the ability to communicate and collaborate with all members of the interprofessional team, in order to promote patient safety and quality of care. She has been in the nursing faculty role for several years. She received the Miriam Agnes Payne Award in 1990. She is a member of the Omicron Omicron Chapter of Sigma Theta Tau International.

FAQs

This online MSN program is accredited by the Commission on Collegiate Nursing Education (CCNE), the premier accrediting agency for baccalaureate and graduate nursing programs. It is also endorsed by the American Holistic Nurses Certification Corporation.

This nursing practice program is approved by the Ohio Board of Nursing (OBN).

The typical salary in the state of Ohio for a Nurse Educator with an MSN is just over 70,000 dollars a year as a nurse educator with an MSN commonly has more experience which leads to better patient outcomes. This salary estimate is an average and can be higher or lower depending on the specific field a Nurse Educator with an MSN works in. It is also important to factor in possible local nursing shortages and shortages of other health professionals in different areas when looking at possible salaries.

No. The MSN degree is from Xavier University and is awarded on meeting coursework standards that are independent of course delivery mode. Participants will earn an MSN degree.

Yes! Xavier University and the College of Nursing have been consistently recognized at the national level for having one of the best online MSN programs for nursing education. See a list of all of nursing school awards by program on our Rankings page.

The tuition rate for the online MSN program is $670 per credit hour. The total cost of the degree program will vary, depending upon transfer credits awarded, additional fees and the cost of textbooks/materials. See the Tuition page for more information.

No, online courses charge the same rate as all other courses.

Students may find that they can get to know their professor/instructor and other nursing practice students better in an online course than in a traditional face-to-face course. There are many options for interacting with your instructors and classmates in your online program, including discussion boards, video or audio files from your instructor, email and video conferencing. There may be additional opportunities for interaction available based on the course and instructor.

Courses are offered in semester-long increments in most cases. Depending on the course and semester, there are a couple of courses that are 6-10 weeks in length.

Participation expectations vary by professor. Courses will be asynchronous with no set meeting times; however, professors often have different teaching strategies and they do have the option of including synchronous online sessions in their courses. The faculty in this nursing program is very sensitive to the need for flexibility of working professionals and are often open to adjustments in curriculum development. The need for asynchronous meetings for the scholarly project may be required.

We recognize that students may be in the process of completing other baccalaureate degrees or an associate degree while also enrolled, therefore online MSN programs allow a maximum of 6 years for completion.

Some potential nursing career paths may include:

  • Nurse educator, staff educator, clinical instructor, educational nursing care consultant and continuing education provider.

The education track of the MSN program helps better prepare students by requiring 2 practicum experiences via NURS 703 and 705. Each course requires 90 hours of practicum with an MSN-prepared nurse educator. Students are responsible for finding their own preceptors, and preceptor approval is required from the course faculty. Faculty advisors may help in locating and securing a practicum preceptor.