Troy's post-master's DNP: the synthesis project, agency approval and your hours
For its 6000-level clinical courses, Troy University's DNP manual puts recruiting on students, who "contact prospective preceptors," while faculty "can assist students by suggesting preceptors." Post-master's students start at the 8000 level instead, and the step that sets your timeline sits in NSG 8820, where you must win approval from the agency or setting that will be home to your DNP Synthesis Project. We help you find that agency and arrive with a complete request.
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Share your project idea, your city and your start term.
Who enters at the post-master's level
Troy's post-master's DNP is for nurses who already hold a master's in nursing and an active clinical specialty certification (CNS, NP or CRNA). Someone with a non-clinical MSN joins the FNP or Nurse Leader track instead, and a master's in a field other than nursing enters at the post-BSN level. Your full-time study begins in a fall semester. Troy's DNP page lists a separate degree map for this route, and its semester planners sit in the DNP Student Organization course.
Because you arrive with graduate clinical hours already completed, Troy counts them. You document those master's hours on the Verification of Post-Baccalaureate Clinical Hours for the DNP Program Coordinator, and they count toward Troy's 1,000. Request official hour records from your master's program early, since the form depends on them. The DNP 1,000-hour rule page explains how the total is built.
The synthesis sequence, course by course
Everything at the 8000 level turns on the DNP Synthesis Project, the DSP. The DNP manual's outline for the synthesis courses sets out this order.
| Course | What the manual asks |
|---|---|
NSG 8810 Project Identification | Form your DSP Committee early, using the DNP Project Advisory Committee Form |
NSG 8820 Project Development | Obtain external agency or setting approval, win approval of the DSP proposal and submit a Troy IRB application |
NSG 8830 Project Implementation | Begins only after Troy IRB approval, unless an exception is approved |
NSG 8840 Project Evaluation | Evaluate the project, with clinical-hours documentation as in every synthesis course |
NSG 8860 Continuation of Doctoral Synthesis Project | For students who need more time to finish the project |
NSG 8880 Directed Professional Practicum | 1 to 3 credits at 60 clinical hours each, up to 180, for students short of 1,000 |
Clinical hours are documented in each synthesis course, and your portfolio closes with reflections on them. Course-level detail is on DNP synthesis courses.
Agency approval in NSG 8820
The DNP manual's progression policy for NSG 8820 leaves no room for doubt: the student secures approval from the outside agency or setting. Troy accepts it in one of two forms, a support letter or the agency's own IRB approval. In the same course you also need your DSP proposal approved and a Troy IRB application submitted, and your DSP Chair and Committee approve that application.
The order matters. NSG 8830 cannot begin until Troy's IRB approves, unless an exception is approved, and the IRB file is stronger with the agency's agreement already in hand. An agency that takes weeks to produce a letter pushes every later step back, which is why post-master's students do best when the conversation starts before NSG 8820 opens.
What to bring to a first agency conversation
- A one-page summary of the practice problem and the project's aims
- Your DSP Chair's name and your planned timeline from
NSG 8820toNSG 8840 - What you need from the agency: data, staff time, space or access to a unit
- A question about whether the agency's own IRB or quality office must review the project
Preceptors and mentors at the 8000 level
Troy's manuals set out detailed preceptor rules for the 6000-level clinical courses. The synthesis courses require documented clinical hours, but the DNP manual does not describe an 8000-level preceptor or mentor the way it describes FNP and Nurse Leader preceptors. Ask your DSP Chair who should verify hours you log at your project agency, and get the answer in writing.
NSG 8880 is where many post-master's students meet a preceptor question. It adds 60 hours per credit, up to 180. Plan it the way the DNP manual plans every clinical course: a graduate-prepared professional, a setting away from your own job, each preceptor and site kept within the two-use cap, and faculty confirmation before any hour is logged. The work setting and reuse rules page covers both limits.
Clearance, the final presentation and the time limit
Post-master's students clear the same clinical requirements as the rest of the DNP through ViewPoint Screening, with a drug test and background check ahead of their first clinical course and annually from then on. Keep your RN license unencumbered in whichever state hosts your project or practicum.
The program ends with the Final Competency Evaluation, your DSP presentation before the DSP Committee, held by distance technology. Troy also expects a conference abstract sent to a national meeting and a manuscript drawn from the project, and it brings every DNP graduate to the Troy campus for convocation.
The DNP manual allows five years to finish, and the 2025-26 Graduate Catalog also gives five years for post-master's students. That catalog requires a B or better in NSG 8812, the evidence-based practice research course, and a C or lower there must be repeated.
How we help post-master's DNP students
We are built around Troy's process, and for post-master's students that means the project agency as much as any preceptor. We identify organizations near you whose work fits your practice problem, approach them with a clear summary of what the DNP Synthesis Project will ask, and help you assemble what the NSG 8820 approval needs: the project summary, the timeline and the right contact to sign the letter of support.
If you need NSG 8880 hours, we find a graduate-prepared professional in a setting outside your workplace and prepare the preceptor details faculty ask for. We keep a record of every preceptor and site you use, tell you early if an agency needs a formal agreement with the School of Nursing, and remain available if a contact leaves mid-semester. Your faculty and DSP Committee make every approval; our part is handing them a complete package. The agency agreements page explains the paperwork, and the form below starts your plan.
Questions Troy students ask
What counts as agency approval for Troy's NSG 8820?
Either a support letter from the outside agency or setting, or that agency's own IRB approval, satisfies the DNP manual. You need it in NSG 8820 together with approval of your DSP proposal and a submitted Troy IRB application. A letter on agency letterhead from someone able to commit staff or data carries the most weight; share it with your DSP Chair first.
Do my master's clinical hours count toward Troy's 1,000 DNP hours?
Verified post-baccalaureate clinical hours do. You record them on the Verification of Post-Baccalaureate Clinical Hours, which goes to the DNP Program Coordinator. Documented hours from the synthesis courses are added on top, and anyone still short can take NSG 8880 for 60 hours per credit, up to 180. The coordinator confirms your starting total.
Can my DNP project take place where I work?
Troy's preceptorship guidelines keep clinical hours out of your own employer's unit or setting, while the NSG 8820 policy speaks only of approval from the external agency or setting. Whether your employer can host the project, and whether hours logged there count, is a question for your DSP Chair and faculty advisor. Ask before approaching the agency.
Do post-master's DNP students need a preceptor at Troy?
The DNP manual writes its preceptor rules for 6000-level clinical courses and does not describe a separate 8000-level preceptor. What post-master's students must secure is agency approval in NSG 8820. If you take NSG 8880 to reach 1,000 hours, ask faculty who should supervise those hours; that is where a preceptor search usually begins.
Is the Troy DNP final presentation held on campus?
No. The Final Competency Evaluation, where you present your DNP Synthesis Project to the DSP Committee, takes place by distance technology. Troy's one on-campus event for DNP graduates is convocation on the Troy campus. Before that, the project also becomes an abstract for a national conference and a manuscript.
Related pages
Last checked 2026-09-27
We check these pages against Troy's own 2026-27 MSN, DNP, AMSN and RN to BSN orientation manuals, program pages, degree maps and state authorization pages. Your faculty advisor, your course faculty and the School of Nursing have the final word.
Troy asks you to recruit your preceptor. We make that the easy part.
Tell us your Troy program, where you live and which semester your next clinical course starts. We find preceptors who meet Troy's rules for the course, check the setting against Troy's limits, and prepare everything the Preceptor Information Form and biosketch ask for, well ahead of the form deadline.
- Preceptors matched to the course: a graduate-prepared NP or physician for
NSG 6619, pediatrics and women's health forNSG 6666, adults and older adults forNSG 6668 - Preceptor Information Form details, a biosketch and a copy of the preceptor's license, ready for your faculty advisor
- In your own area, in Alabama or a state where Troy can offer clinicals, never in your own work setting
Start your placement plan
Program, city and semester is all we need to begin.