Virginia: GW Nursing's campus state

GW's authorizations for Virginia residents

Virginia carries no GW enrollment limit. The State Authorizations page names no Virginia restriction, and GW's licensure disclosures mark Virginia as meeting requirements for every NP route (master's, DNP and post-master's certificate) and for nurse-midwifery. The Virginia Board of Nursing's own approvals reach only GW's prelicensure programs taught in Ashburn.

Virginia's nurse practitioner law in 2026

Virginia sits in AANP's restricted category. Va. Code § 54.1-2957(C) ties any NP below the experience threshold to a practice agreement, written or electronic, with a physician on the patient care team. Subsection I lifts that requirement once the NP has the equivalent of at least three years of full-time clinical experience, as the Boards determine. The section was amended in 2024 and twice in 2025, and no 2026 change was found.

The law divides Virginia NPs into those still on a practice agreement and those practicing on their own, and GW's preceptor standard, which asks for two years of advanced practice and a clean license from an NP, physician or certified nurse-midwife, fits either kind. Physician-led practices, common under this model, are equally good hosts. The Northern Virginia preceptor guide shows how this plays out when you approach practices.

Northern Virginia and the rest of the state

About 3.2 million Virginians live in the Washington metro area, and that is where GW's listed organization partners cluster: Inova, Virginia Hospital Center in Arlington and HCA, whose Northern Virginia hospitals include Reston Hospital Center. UVA Community Health also takes advanced practice rotation requests for its Prince William, Haymarket and Culpeper sites through ACEMAPP. Site-by-site rules are on the Northern Virginia guide.

Beyond the Beltway, NP students look to Sentara Health in Hampton Roads, whose Virginia Beach-Chesapeake-Norfolk metro holds about 1.7 million Virginians; VCU Health in the Richmond metro, about 1.4 million; UVA Health in Charlottesville; and Carilion Clinic around Roanoke. Each sets its own student process, and GW's affiliation agreement is needed wherever you train. For FNP, AGPCNP and PMHNP students, any of these regions is open; for acute care students, only the north is.

NPIP: Virginia's preceptor incentive and GW

The Nurse Preceptor Incentive Program moved from the Virginia Department of Health to the Virginia Nursing Workforce Center under SB 405, signed March 31, 2026. VDH stopped taking applications after April 30, 2026, and the Center takes them for preceptorships completed on or after July 1, 2026, paying on a sliding scale by hours precepted in a semester. The current eligibility wording asks for:

• A student enrolled in a Virginia public or private nonprofit school of nursing, with rotations certified by that school; self-certification is not accepted.
• A preceptor holding a current, valid and unrestricted Virginia license at or above the student's level, who has lived in Virginia for at least one year.
• Under the earlier VDH guidelines, a preceptor receiving concurrent compensation was not disqualified.

GW is a boundary case. It is a private nonprofit university headquartered in DC, its nursing school's offices are in Ashburn, Virginia approves its BSN and DC approves its APRN programs. No list of eligible schools is published and GW has said nothing about NPIP, so whether a GW NP student's preceptor qualifies is unconfirmed. Treat it as a question the Center answers.