NEOSHO, Mo. — If you think a nursing program has to be in a big metropolitan area to be among the best in the state, think again. Southwest Missouri is the home to one.
According to the RegisteredNursing.Org, the Crowder College nursing program based in Cassville is ranked number two in the entire state of Missouri when it comes to graduates passing the state nursing board examination. Crowder’s program in Neosho is not far behind, ranked ninth in the show-me state.
Sandra Wilson is the director of the nursing program here at Crowder and she says this isn’t the first time they’ve been ranked highly. And she says there’s no secret to the program’s success, just a lot of hard work on the part of students and faculty.
Sandra Wilson RN, Crowder College Director of Nursing, said, “So overall, our entire statistics for Crowder College would be extremely high, but the Cassville Campus has multiple years in a row of 100% pass rates and you will find them as number two on the list in the state of Missouri.”
Wilson says the rankings are based on the percent of graduates that passed their state boards over the last five years. She says the McDonald County program, which is ranked at 25th, would be rated higher but has only been operating for a few years. And she’ll put her graduates up against any other’s in the show-me state.
“Well some of the metropolitan areas, Barnes-Jewish, I believe St. Louis University is on that list, we’re up against some pretty big competition.”
While many nursing programs have seen a major decline in the number of students going into a nursing program since the covid-19 pandemic started, she says the number going into Crowder programs has remained just about the same as in years past.
