NSU clinicals for students living in the Florida Keys
Monroe County strings its towns along one chain of islands from Key Largo to Key West, and that shape drives every NSU clinical decision you make here. NSU expects clinical hours every week of a course, and a coordinator placement measured from the Lower Keys can land on the mainland in Miami-Dade, a long drive to repeat weekly. A preceptor you find in the Keys, named to your clinical coordinator two semesters ahead, is how you keep those weeks close to home.
Get your placement plan
Tell us your NSU program and your home ZIP area. A placement advisor replies with preceptor and site options near you that fit your NSU course.
Monroe County through an NSU lens
Key West is the county seat, and Marathon, Islamorada, Key Colony Beach and Layton are the other incorporated places; Key Largo anchors the Upper Keys. The federal metro area runs from Key West to Key Largo. NSU has no campus in the Keys: its nearest nursing campus is Miami, which teaches the BSN, and its APRN tracks are taught online, so your home address matters more than any campus.
The Florida Center for Nursing folds Monroe into its South region with Broward and Miami-Dade. That region's NP supply figures are driven by the two mainland counties and tell you little about the Keys. State lists also disagree on whether Monroe is rural: the Florida Department of Health's Office of Rural Health counts it as a rural county, while FloridaCommerce's rural list leaves it out.
Where NP students in the Keys look
No published NP student process for a Keys hospital is on file, so the local search starts with outpatient and public settings:
- Community health centers. HRSA lists four Community Health of South Florida sites in Monroe and the Rural Health Network of Monroe County. Community Health of South Florida also ranked in the top ten of TEACH facilities by reimbursement in SFY 2024-25, a sign it is organized to take trainees, though not a sign of any tie to NSU.
- The county health department. The Florida Department of Health in Monroe County is the public setting on the islands.
- Private practices. Family and internal medicine practices in Key West, Marathon and the Upper Keys suit the FNP primary-care sequence that starts with
NSG 5549. - VA clinics. The Miami VA runs clinics in Key West and Key Largo. VA takes NP trainees only through an affiliation agreement the school arranges, so treat these as a question for your clinical coordinator.
HRSA marks no geographic or population shortage area in Monroe, though it lists one health center as a facility shortage area. The two 95-hour FNP courses, NSG 5589 in pediatrics and NSG 5569 in women's health, need a preceptor whose patients fit, and your coordinator judges that fit. AGACNP students may need a mainland hospital, and the Miami-Dade guide covers how those systems take NP students. PMHNP students look for psychiatric practices on the islands first.
Weekly hours on an island chain
Three NSU rules shape a Keys schedule. Clinical hours begin when the course's didactic work begins, they run weekly, and they cannot be saved up for a burst at either end of the term. All three are in the handbook, and the weekly hours page explains them.
If your preceptor practices on the mainland, every clinical week means a trip up the chain and back. Two things help: a preceptor who offers one long clinical day rather than several short ones, and a site at the southern end of Miami-Dade rather than farther north. If a trip falls through, NSU asks you to alert the preceptor, site and program director no later than two hours beforehand, tell the clinical coordinator too, and make up every missed hour.
What 150 miles covers from Key West and Key Largo
If no preceptor is on file, NSU's clinical coordinator chooses your site within a 150-mile circle drawn around your home ZIP code, and that choice is final. From Key West, a circle that size covers the whole island chain and reaches mainland Miami-Dade, with much of the rest open water. From Key Largo the same radius runs north through Broward and Palm Beach counties and west to Naples.
The handbook calls it a radius and says no more, so ask your clinical coordinator how distance is judged for a Keys address. The 150-mile rule page has the rest of the placement detail, and own preceptor vs NSU placement weighs one route against the other.
Florida's preceptor rule applies on the islands too
A Keys preceptor needs the same credentials as one in Orlando: a Florida APRN, physician (MD or DO) or dentist license, with your own RN license coming under chapter 464. Primary-care NPs who registered as autonomous qualify, and so do NPs practicing under a physician protocol. The Florida preceptor rule guide sets it out.
Why Keys students choose us
We search outward from your end of the island chain: the practices and health centers nearest you first, then the mainland sites with the shortest weekly trip. Every preceptor we bring you fits your NSU course and arrives with the license and site details NSU reviews, in hand before your notice date, so the coordinator's review goes smoothly on the first pass.
Questions NSU students ask
Will NSU place me in the Keys if I don't name a preceptor?
Not necessarily. The clinical coordinator can place you anywhere within 150 miles of your residential ZIP code, which from the Keys includes mainland Miami-Dade, and NSU says the placement is not negotiable once made. The only way to choose a Keys site yourself is to find a preceptor there and name them two semesters before the course.
Does Monroe County count as rural for NP clinical purposes?
It depends on the list. The Florida Department of Health counts Monroe as a rural county; FloridaCommerce's rural analysis omits it. For TEACH, what matters is the facility type, not the county: federally qualified health centers such as Community Health of South Florida's Monroe sites are among the facilities that can be paid for hosting primary-care APRN students.
Can I do AGACNP clinicals in the Keys?
With no published NP student process on file for a Keys hospital, an acute-care placement here depends on finding an acute-care preceptor locally and your coordinator approving the site. If none turns up, the Miami-Dade systems are the nearest mainland option. Start early, since NSU needs the name two semesters before NSG 5629.
Are the Key West and Key Largo VA clinics an option?
They belong to the Miami VA Healthcare System, which takes NP trainees only under academic affiliation agreements; requests start with the school, which works through the VA medical center's education officer. If a VA clinician in the Keys is open to precepting, pass that to your clinical coordinator rather than arranging it yourself.
Related pages
Last checked 2026-09-25
We check these pages against NSU's own handbook, catalog and program pages. The graduate clinical guide, your course in Canvas, your clinical coordinator and your program director have the final word.
NSU lets you name your own preceptor. We make sure you have one, close to home and in time.
Tell us your NSU program, your home ZIP area and when your next clinical course starts. We find preceptors who fit the course and have everything ready for your clinical coordinator well before the two-semester notice.
- Preceptors matched to the course: primary care for FNP, acute care for AGACNP, psychiatric care for PMHNP, a practice site for DNP project hours
- Named early enough for NSU's two-semester notice, with license, credentials and site details ready for the coordinator
- Close to your home ZIP code, with clinic days we plan around your work schedule
Start your placement plan
Program, ZIP area and start term is all we need to begin.