How to Become a Certified Nurse Executive (Nursing Administrator)

The American Nurses Credentialing Center (ANCC) provides certification for nurse executives with experience in nursing administration. All applicants who are eligible must then pass the nurse executive exam to get ANCC certification.

This certification is for higher-level nursing professionals. As such, it requires at least a bachelor’s degree in nursing and a current license to work as a registered nurse. RN’s in other countries also qualify if they have the equivalent of an RN degree in their country.

This nurse executive program also requires two years of full-time work in the past 5 years as at least a mid-level nursing administrator. Others who qualify are educators teaching grad students in nursing administration, nursing managers, and executive consultants.

The last requirement is 30 hours of continuing education in nursing administration in the past 3 years. Those with a U.S. master’s degree in nursing administration are exempt from this nursing executive certification eligibility requirement.

Eligible nurses with the requisite training and experience as a nurse executive/administrator can then apply and pay $395 to take the nurse executive exam. American Nurses Association members pay a reduced price of $270.

Candidates with specific and recent education in nursing administration may already have the reference textbooks to prepare for the certification exam. At any rate, all applicants can get a general idea of what is on the test by purchasing and studying the textbooks and other references found on the ANCC’s list of nurse executive exam references. See the link in the Resources below to view this list of test resources.

Use the test content outline when studying the references to find out what you need to study in those books. Do not take the test until you have gone through the outline one by one and ensured that you have at least touched upon every topic in your nurse executive exam preparation. ANCC also has a handful of nurse executive practice questions. Save at least half of these until after you have studied for the exam. Otherwise, it will be hard to assess your exam readiness level.

Resources:

ANCC: Nurse Executive Exam Reference List

ANCC: Nurse Executive Exam Content Outline

ANCC: Nursing Administration Practice Questions


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