Ball State's MS in Nursing from Hawaii: license, Board and preceptors
Hawaii residents can enroll in Ball State's online MS in Nursing, FNP concentration included, but not in the post-master's FNP certificate or the DNP. Two things set Hawaii apart: compact licenses from other states carry no weight there, so the RN license under your clinical hours must come from Hawaii's own board, and the single required trip to Muncie crosses an ocean.
Get your placement plan
Tell us your Ball State program and where you live. A placement advisor replies with preceptor and site options in your community that fit your Ball State course.
Hawaii's entry on Ball State's authorization map
Ball State's State Authorization Map keeps a page for every state. Hawaii's lists one graduate nursing program as authorized, and that one entry covers all three master's concentrations.
| Ball State program | Status for Hawaii residents |
|---|---|
| MS in Nursing: Family Nurse Practitioner | Authorized |
| MS in Nursing: Nurse Educator | Authorized |
| MS in Nursing: Leadership and Management | Authorized |
| Post-Master's Certificate: FNP | Not authorized |
| Doctor of Nursing Practice, all cognates | Not authorized |
Ball State issues no Hawaii licensure determination; its Professional Licensure page sends students to the board where they plan to work, which here is the Hawaii Board of Nursing in the Department of Commerce and Consumer Affairs' Professional and Vocational Licensing Division. After admission, both your address and your clinical hours have to stay in authorized territory; clinicals outside Indiana has the detail.
No compact privilege: your clinicals ride on a Hawaii license
Hawaii remains a non-compact state, and NCSBN's compact map records no bill pending to change that. However far your multistate license reaches on the mainland, it confers no right to care for patients in Hawaii, so every clinical hour needs a license Hawaii issued. Ball State's catalog adds that it be active and unencumbered where you practice.
Nurses who arrived recently on a mainland license feel this most. Get the Hawaii license settled before your first clinical term, then upload it to American Data Bank, where a single review can take several business days. The RN license guide covers the ADB side and renewals.
What the Hawaii Board has said about out-of-state programs
HRS 457-13(2) lets nursing students practice as part of their studies only when their program holds Hawaii Board accreditation. In a 2016 decision, its Education Committee declined to let a North Dakota BSN program bring an unlicensed student to Hawaii for clinicals.
Licensed nurses fall under a separate Board FAQ written about distance programs such as RN-to-BSN and LPN-to-RN. Programs without a Hawaii campus, it says, get no Board approval because there is nothing to apply for, and they owe the Board no notice. Faculty need Hawaii licensure only when physically present with a student in the islands. Nothing from Hawaii speaks to graduate or APRN programs specifically, so raise it with the Graduate Clinical Placement Coordinator before your first Hawaii site.
Primary care preceptors from Honolulu to the neighbor islands
Urban Honolulu is by far the largest metro, near 988,700 residents in the Census Bureau's 2025 estimate; Hilo-Kailua counted around 210,000 and Kahului-Wailuku around 160,700. Four systems anchor hospital care where NP students look: Kaiser Permanente Hawaii; HHSC, the Hawaii Health Systems Corporation; Hawaii Pacific Health, parent of Straub, Kapiolani, Pali Momi and Wilcox; and The Queen's Health Systems. Every one keeps separate student rules.
Away from Honolulu, check early that a pediatric practice for NUR 682 and a women's health practice for NUR 684 sit within reach, alongside the adult clinics that NUR 681 and NUR 683 need. Your own unit or clinic is off the table for FNP hours. Ball State asks you to secure placements in your community, with faculty support when a problem comes up (finding your own preceptor).
Planning the Muncie day from the islands
The FNP concentration asks for one campus visit: 8 hours of clinical time on the Muncie campus, part of NUR 681. Ball State does not post the date publicly, and its catalog leaves clinical travel costs with the student, so reserve room in that semester for a long flight and book once course faculty name the day. Educator and leadership students have no such trip.
Why Hawaii students start with us
Your placement advisor searches inside Hawaii, island by island, for preceptors who fit your exact Ball State course, checks each site against Ball State's rules and your Hawaii license, and assembles the standard affiliation agreement's details a full term or more before your course, with a second agency ready. Tell us your island and course.
Questions Ball State students ask
Can I keep studying with Ball State if I move from Hawaii to California?
Not in a nursing program. Ball State's map excludes California from all of its nursing programs, and its program pages say relocating to a state off your program's list halts your progress. Check the map before any move, and report a completed move to the Clinical Placement Coordinator within a week.
Can a Hawaii nurse earn Ball State's DNP?
Not while living in Hawaii. Ball State's DNP, created on the map in September 2025, is authorized in six places: Indiana, Alaska, Arkansas, Delaware, Florida and Georgia. For a Hawaii resident, the graduate route Ball State offers is the MS in Nursing, with FNP, Nurse Educator and Leadership and Management concentrations.
Does my Ball State instructor need a Hawaii nursing license?
The Hawaii Board's FAQ on distance post-licensure programs ties a faculty license to physical presence: only faculty teaching or precepting in person in Hawaii need one. Ball State's course faculty teach online, while your on-site preceptor is a Hawaii clinician. The FAQ's examples are RN-to-BSN style programs, so confirm the graduate case with Ball State.
Can I complete NUR 672 at the Hawaii hospital where I work?
Yes, in principle: Ball State's concentration pages let educator and leadership students complete the 180 practicum hours of NUR 672 at work, with a master's- or doctoral-prepared RN supervising. The MS FAQ bars clinicals in your own unit, so aim for a different unit or department in the same Hawaii hospital and confirm the setting with course faculty.
Related pages
Last checked 2026-09-26
We check these pages against Ball State's own catalog, graduate handbook, program pages and State Authorization Map, and Indiana rules. Your course faculty, your advisor and the Graduate Clinical Placement Coordinator have the final word.
Ball State asks you to find your preceptor. We find one near you.
Tell us your Ball State track, where you live and when your next clinical course starts. We find preceptors near you who fit the course, confirm the practice will sign Ball State's affiliation agreement, and line up a backup, so the School of Nursing can clear the site before the semester.
- Preceptors matched to the course: pediatrics for
NUR 682, women's health forNUR 684, adult primary care forNUR 681andNUR 683 - Outside your own unit or clinic, in a state where Ball State's program is authorized
- Across Indiana, from Muncie to Evansville, and in the other states Ball State accepts
Start your placement plan
Program, city and start date is all we need to begin.