Predictive value of selected admission criteria for graduate nursing education

To determine if there are admission criteria that predict success in graduate nursing education, an investigation was conducted of 193 graduates who had successfully completed the masters nursing program at a private eastern university. Admission criteria and other variables chosen were nursing, nonnursing, and cumulative undergraduate grade point averages (GPAs); verbal, quantitative, and combined Graduate Record Examination (GRE) scores; age at entrance; number of years intervening between attainment of the bachelors and completion of the masters degree; and, number of years intervening between the basic nursing education and the completion of the masters degree. Each variable was correlated with masters GPA for degree of association. Pearson's coefficient of correlation was used to analyze the data. Subgroups were analyzed in relation to the chosen area of clinical concentration: community health, psychiatric, medical-surgical, and maternal-child nursing; basic nursing education: diploma or generic baccalaureate; and, marital status: single or married. Nursing, nonnursing, and cumulative undergraduate GPAs were found to be weakly associated with the masters GPA except for the psychiatric subgroup which showed a moderate correlation between the cumulative under-graduate and the masters GPAs. Weak associations were found between verbal, quantitative, and total GRE scores and the masters GPA, with two exceptions: for psychiatric and community health subgroups there were moderate degrees of association between verbal GRE scores and the masters GPA. Age was not an effective criterion for predicting degree of success in the program. Both measures of intervening years were found to be weakly associated with the masters GPA.