Florida clinicals and licensure for FIU nursing students
Florida International University (FIU) states that its licensure programs meet Florida's requirements, a statement it makes for no other state, and its long-standing clinical area is four Florida counties: Miami-Dade, Broward, Palm Beach and Monroe. Online primary care NP students may train farther afield in the state, where a Board of Nursing rule wants your preceptor licensed in Florida and your RN license issued under chapter 464.
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Tell us your FIU program and where you live. A placement advisor replies with the preceptor and site options that fit your FIU course.
What FIU says about Florida
Every FIU statement about where you may study and be licensed is written from Florida outward.
| FIU source | What it says for Florida |
|---|---|
| Professional Licensure page | Nursing (BSN), Nursing (MSN) and the DNP in Nurse Anesthesia meet Florida's licensing requirements; the DNP NP tracks, the post-MSN DNP and the post-graduate NP certificates have no entry |
| MSN and DNP admissions pages | A current Florida RN license is required, and applicants licensed elsewhere obtain one before admission |
| RN to BSN/MSN page | A Florida RN license or an enhanced multistate (eNLC) license is accepted |
| MSN Clinical Education page | Monroe, Dade, Broward and Palm Beach are the long-standing clinical area; online AGPCNP and PNP students may train beyond it, identify the site, and start only once a contract is signed |
| Nursing department pages and graduate handbook | Every FIU nursing program is approved by the Florida Board of Nursing |
For a Florida resident, most of what puzzles out-of-state students drops away. What remains is practical: a preceptor whose license and practice suit your course, at a site FIU can contract with, lined up early enough for the paperwork. The disclosure's wording is unpacked on our licensure disclosure page.
FIU's four home counties, and how far the online tracks reach
FIU's graduate nursing office sits in the AHC 3 building of the Modesto A. Maidique Campus, while Accelerated Option BSN classes meet on the North Miami campus at Biscayne Bay. The long-standing clinical area surrounds both: three mainland counties, Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach, plus Monroe and its island chain. The first three counties form a single metro that the Census Bureau put at roughly 6.4 million residents for 2025.
On the predominantly online Adult-Gerontology Primary Care and Pediatric Primary Care tracks, FIU lets students train outside those counties. You identify the site, FIU's clinical department works on the contract, and nothing starts until it is signed. FIU applies that wording to the online certificates and the online post-BSN to DNP specialties as well, while hybrid FNP, PMHNP and AGACNP students lean on the designated clinical department, which assists them one on one.
Farther north, Tampa Bay's metro holds roughly 3.4 million people, greater Orlando nearly 3.0 million and Jacksonville close to 1.8 million. Online-track students in those regions may still owe FIU one to three campus visits a semester, so count the drive to Miami. For county detail, see Miami-Dade, Broward, Palm Beach and the Keys and the rest of Florida.
Protocol or autonomous practice: the APRNs who precept you
Florida APRNs practice one of two ways. By default they work under an established protocol with a supervising physician or dentist, a copy kept at each practice location. Rule 64B9-4.001(14) defines the general supervision involved: the physician or dentist authorizes the procedures and stays reachable for consultation without needing to be present. AANP places Florida among restricted practice states on that basis, noting that exemptions may apply.
The exemption is autonomous practice under s. 464.0123, confined to primary care, which the law describes as general internal medicine, general pediatrics or family medicine and the Board's rule stretches to behavioral and mental health conditions. An APRN registers after 3,000 or more physician-supervised clinical hours in the last five years, three graduate semester hours in pharmacology and three in differential diagnosis within that window, a clear, active Florida APRN license and five years without discipline.
Both kinds of APRN meet the Board's preceptor definition, so either can teach an FIU primary care student. Some prescribing limits apply in either clinic: Schedule II supplies are capped at 7 days, except psychiatric medications from a psychiatric nurse, and the E-FORCSE database is checked before a controlled substance goes to any patient aged 16 or over. See Florida APRN practice and preceptors.
Rule 64B9-4.001(13): a Florida license on both sides
The Board of Nursing wrote its preceptor definition into rule 64B9-4.001(13). Certified practicing APRNs qualify, and so do dentists and physicians holding an MD or DO, provided they supervise, teach and evaluate the NP student where care is delivered. Place that site in Florida and a licensing condition attaches to each of you: the preceptor's license must be Florida's, and yours must be an RN license under chapter 464. Subsection 11 of the same rule calls the arrangement a preceptorship, supervised patient care for a specified period.
FIU's handbook then asks for more: a year or more in the field or specialty, active licensure, national certification, and a review of education, experience, nursing philosophy and willingness to teach. It also requires a master's in nursing while naming physicians as preceptors, a conflict set out on our preceptor requirements page.
No Florida rule assigns the preceptor search to the school or the student, so FIU's own instruction governs, and online-track students find their own site. The Board's program-approval statute, s. 464.019, is aimed at prelicensure programs.
A clinician licensed only outside Florida cannot be your preceptor at a Florida site under rule 64B9-4.001(13). Confirm the Florida license and its expiration date before you ask.
What Baptist Health South Florida and Cleveland Clinic Florida ask of schools
Neither system's page says whether FIU holds an agreement with it, so read what follows as each system's own rules and check with FIU's Office of Clinical Education about a contract before approaching anyone there.
Baptist Health South Florida hears rotation requests from its partner or affiliate schools alone, once both a Master Agreement and a Program Letter of Agreement are fully executed. Before requesting, the student needs a confirmed placement and preceptor; the school coordinator can help, or a student may locate a Baptist preceptor through the Baptist website. Every rotation, up to four months long, needs its own Complio profile, filed at least 10 business days ahead, and requests arrive through Complio only, the same platform FIU's graduate handbook names. Staff of Baptist cannot log clinical hours where they are employed, and students wait for a clearance email before setting foot on site.
Cleveland Clinic Florida puts the request entirely in the school's hands. Its onboarding page lets only an academic representative arrange a placement, and only after a fully executed affiliation agreement; the school fills in the onboarding request, APRN partnerships run through the Office of Advanced Practice, and background checks come with the school's attestation. With either system, your first conversation is with FIU. See Florida NP preceptors for more.
Miami-Dade shortage areas and Florida's TEACH funding
HRSA's data, current to late September 2026, shows 39 primary care Health Professional Shortage Areas (HPSAs) in Miami-Dade, with 20 designated, 19 proposed for withdrawal and none geographic. Just three of the 22 low-income population HPSAs are still designated: Liberty City, Little Haiti and Wynwood Park. The other 19, Hialeah Gardens and Little Havana among them, were proposed for withdrawal on September 22, 2025. The remainder are 10 federally qualified health centers (FQHCs), 6 correctional facilities and one tribal or urban Indian health site. On the mental health side, 19 of the county's 20 HPSAs are designated, the South Florida Behavioral Network, Circuit 11, among them.
Many of those clinics are exactly what Florida's TEACH program funds. Created under s. 409.91256 by 2024's SB 7016, Training, Education, and Clinicals in Health reimburses facilities, never individual preceptors: FQHCs and community mental health centers, rural health clinics, certified community behavioral health clinics, and some nonprofits in shortage areas. It names primary care APRN students, requires Florida-licensed preceptors, covers students of accredited Florida-based programs, depends on appropriations and is set for repeal on July 1, 2034. Florida has no preceptor tax credit, and the PRECEPT Nurses Act in Congress remains only a bill.
From FIU graduate to Florida APRN
- License and degreeAny US jurisdiction's RN license counts at this stage, alongside a finished master's or post-master's certificate; FIU says its MSN meets Florida's requirements.
- CertificationPass a recognized specialty board's exam, after the certification review course FIU's handbook requires in the year before you apply for it, and have the board report the result to the Florida Board of Nursing.
- Application and fingerprintsApply online with the fee and book Livescan fingerprints for the FDLE check under the correct ORI number; HB 975 made them a condition of approval.
- Coverage and reviewFile proof of malpractice insurance or an exemption. The Board reviews within 30 days and writes if something is missing.
- Protocol and later stepsKeep your protocol at each practice location once licensed. A dispensing application, the 3-hour controlled-substance prescribing course every biennial renewal and, much later, autonomous registration come after.
Florida has been a Nurse Licensure Compact state since January 19, 2018, which is why Florida residents can carry a multistate RN license. Only five states have passed the APRN Compact, Florida not among them, and it operates only once seven have, so a Florida APRN license stops at the state line. FIU's own RN license rule has a separate Florida RN license page.
Why FIU students in Florida choose us
We search in person in your own county or city, matching the course: NGR 6201L calls for adult and older-adult primary care, NGR 6301L for pediatric primary care, and DNP residency hours for an organizational mentor. Each candidate is checked against rule 64B9-4.001(13) and FIU's handbook, from the Florida license and its expiration to national certification, a year or more in the specialty, no family tie and a unit other than your own.
Early on, we learn if FIU has a contract with the practice, and if not, a new contract's lead time goes into your plan. Every Preceptor Request Form field is gathered, your Complio or FIU Express clearance and the 7-day Typhon rule stay in view, and if a preceptor backs out mid-term we are already lining up the next. Approval of each site and preceptor stays with FIU's clinical education staff and faculty, who see a request from you that is whole, accurate and inside FIU's rules on first reading. Send your track, county and practicum semester in the form below.
Questions FIU students ask
Can I do FIU clinicals in Orlando, Tampa or Jacksonville?
If you are on the online AGPCNP or PNP track, FIU's Clinical Education page allows sites outside Monroe, Dade, Broward and Palm Beach counties, provided you identify the site and the clinical department has a signed contract first. Hybrid FNP, PMHNP and AGACNP students should talk to the graduate nursing clinical coordinator before searching farther north.
Can an APRN with autonomous practice registration be my FIU preceptor?
Florida's rule allows it. Registration under s. 464.0123 leaves an APRN a certified practicing APRN, which is what rule 64B9-4.001(13) asks of a preceptor, together with a Florida license. FIU's handbook layers on its own experience, licensure and certification checks before FIU's clinical staff and faculty decide.
Does Baptist Health South Florida take FIU nurse practitioner students?
Its rotation page limits requests to partner or affiliate schools whose Master Agreement and Program Letter of Agreement are fully executed, and it wants a confirmed placement and preceptor before any request. The page names no partner schools. Before contacting a Baptist preceptor, ask FIU's Office of Clinical Education whether your program is covered.
Do Florida preceptors get a tax credit for teaching NP students?
No such credit exists in Florida law, and the federal PRECEPT Nurses Act remains a bill. Florida's 2024 TEACH program pays qualifying facilities, such as FQHCs and community mental health centers, while their preceptors teach, if funds are appropriated. FIU's own thanks, per its 2022 preceptor manual, take the form of ANCC preceptorship paperwork and a Certificate of Participation that exempts tuition fees.
Is FIU's MSN enough to become an APRN in Florida?
FIU's Professional Licensure page says Nursing (MSN) meets Florida's requirements, yet the degree is only one item. The Florida Board of Nursing also asks for a valid RN license, national certification reported by the certifying board, an online application with Livescan fingerprints and proof of financial responsibility, and, once licensed, a protocol on file.
Related pages
Last checked 2026-09-26
We check these pages against FIU's own graduate handbook, preceptor manual, plans of study, catalog and licensure pages. Your plan of study, your course faculty, your clinical faculty and FIU's Office of Clinical Education have the final word.
FIU asks you to identify your clinical site. We make that the easy part.
Tell us your FIU track, where you live and which semester your next practicum starts. We find preceptors whose patients fit the course, check early whether the site already holds an FIU contract, and prepare everything the Preceptor Request Form asks for.
- Preceptors matched to the course: adult and older-adult primary care for
NGR 6201L, pediatric primary care forNGR 6301L, an organizational mentor forNGR 7940C - Preceptor, facility, license and schedule details ready for the Preceptor Request Form, weeks ahead of the contract clock
- Across Miami-Dade, Broward, Palm Beach and Monroe, or beyond them where FIU approves your site
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