Gonzaga's Clinical Placement Team and who does what
Gonzaga's Clinical Placement Team helps graduate nursing students secure sites and preceptors and clears the contract paperwork each placement needs. It works beside course faculty, who approve sites, clinical faculty, who run the points of contact and site visits, and a small staff of placement and compliance roles. Knowing which role owns which task saves days when a request stalls.
Get your placement plan
Tell us your Gonzaga program and where you live. A placement advisor replies with the preceptor and site options that fit your Gonzaga course.
What the team is there to do
Gonzaga's graduate FAQ describes the team in one sentence: "Our Clinical Placement Team is dedicated to helping students secure sites and preceptors, as well as with processing contract/legal documentation required to clear students for clinical placement." A second line gives the timing: once students have identified potential preceptors, the team "will work with students to finalize clinical placements and preceptor experiences to meet course requirements."
Read together, those lines put the team in the middle of the process rather than at its start. You open the search with local providers; the team helps turn a candidate into a cleared placement, handles the legal side with the site and keeps the placement tied to what the course requires. The placement process guide shows where each handoff happens.
Staff roles in the Department of Nursing
The School of Health Sciences staff page lists these clinical roles by title. Gonzaga's pages describe some duties directly; where they stop, ask the team which role handles your question.
| Role | What Gonzaga's pages connect it to |
|---|---|
| Director of Clinical Placement | The Preceptor Portal's contact for providers interested in precepting, and a contact for CastleBranch questions |
| Clinical Placement Coordinator (two positions) | Placement coordination within the team; the public pages do not split the two roles' duties |
| Graduate Clinical Coordinator | Sends clinical faculty their assignments and forms, according to the FNP clinical faculty packet |
| Clinical Compliance Specialist | Listed on the staff page; the title points to the clearance items sites require |
| BSN Clinical Placement Manager | The pre-licensure side, where the department arranges Spokane BSN clinicals |
| Nursing Immersion and Events Coordinator | The on-campus immersions in Spokane |
For practical problems at a site during the term, Gonzaga's FNP preceptor guide points preceptors to the department's Clinical Coordinator.
Faculty roles that shape your placement
Staff clear the placement; faculty judge it and supervise the learning. Gonzaga's clinical packets split the work like this.
- Course faculty approve clinical site requests, check your logged hours against the credits you registered, spot check the three points of contact and review preceptor evaluations, self-evaluations and site evaluations.
- Clinical faculty join the points of contact, carry out the site visit and grade SOAP notes.
- Program directors lead the FNP, PMHNP and DNP programs, and on the PMHNP track the program faculty give final approval of each preceptor and site.
- Your preceptor supervises and evaluates you at the site; on the Post-Master's DNP, an agency liaison fills that role.
- Your faculty advisor and the Student Services team manage your progression plan, and any off-plan change needs their sign-off first.
The three points of contact and faculty site visits guides cover the clinical faculty side in detail.
Who to contact at each stage
Gonzaga does not publish an organization chart for placements, but its FAQs, packets and portal pages point to a consistent pattern.
| Stage | Usually handled by |
|---|---|
| Finding candidate preceptors | You, with the Clinical Placement Team for sites already under agreement |
| Approving the preceptor and site | Course or program faculty |
| Contract and legal paperwork | The Clinical Placement Team |
| Compliance clearance in CPNW and CastleBranch, or CORE | You, with the department's compliance staff |
| Clinical faculty assignments and forms | The Graduate Clinical Coordinator |
| A problem at the site mid-semester | The Clinical Coordinator and your clinical faculty |
| Questions about preceptor evaluations | nursingpracticum@gonzaga.edu |
Deadlines for each stage sit in the Graduate Nursing Student Handbook, which enrolled students receive rather than the public site. When a question crosses roles, such as a site asking for changes to Gonzaga's agreement, start with the Clinical Placement Team and keep course faculty informed.
The tools the team works in
Gonzaga has been consolidating its clinical systems. A 2024 Gonzaga news story on the change described the department moving from five or six platforms down to two, CORE and CPNW, with CORE taking over compliance documents, onboarding, case and time logs and clinical site management, and all students expected in CORE by spring 2026.
For you, that means more of your placement record lives in CORE: agreement details once stored on SharePoint were slated to move there, giving students access to site requirements such as vaccinations and certifications. Older cohorts may still see Typhon and CastleBranch in their course materials. Preceptor evaluations for most NP practicum courses moved to CORE from Spring 2026. The CORE ELMS guide covers the transition.
Getting the most from the team
The team supports students across ten western states, so the requests that move fastest are the ones that arrive ready.
- Bring a qualified candidate, not an open question. The team works fastest from a named preceptor with license and certification details in hand.
- Supply the site's agreement contact up front, since the contract is often the longest step.
- Keep your clearance current in CPNW and CastleBranch, or CORE if your cohort has moved, so the placement is not held for a missing record.
- Tell the team and course faculty early if a preceptor withdraws; any replacement needs approval and counts toward the two-preceptor limit.
- Keep copies of every approval and agreement confirmation for your own records.
The team finishes placements; the first names on the list still come from you.
Where we fit next to Gonzaga's team
Gonzaga's team is set up to finalize and clear placements. The part before that, finding a qualified provider in your state who will take a Gonzaga student this term, is where our placement desk does its best work. We search in person, confirm the preceptor fits your track and course, and assemble the details the team and faculty need: credentials, license and board certification, the site and its agreement contact, the schedule and the course fit.
You hand over a request that is complete the first time, which lets the contract work start sooner. If a preceptor drops, we begin a replacement search at once. Gonzaga's faculty give the final approval. See how it works or reach the placement desk through the form below.
Questions Gonzaga students ask
How do I reach Gonzaga's Clinical Placement Team?
Use the channels your program gives you: your course site in Canvas, the Graduate Nursing Student Handbook and your faculty advisor point to the current contacts. Gonzaga's Preceptor Portal directs interested providers to the Director of Clinical Placement, and questions about preceptor evaluations go to the practicum inbox listed on the student evaluations page.
Does the Clinical Placement Team approve my preceptor?
Approval sits with faculty. Gonzaga's packets have course faculty approve clinical site requests, and on the PMHNP track the program's faculty make the last call on every preceptor and site. The team's role is securing and finalizing placements and processing the contract paperwork that clears you to start.
Is my faculty advisor part of the placement team?
No. Each online MSN student has a faculty advisor, backed by a Student Services team, who manages the progression plan. Advisors still matter to placements, because moving a practicum to a later term changes your plan, and off-plan changes must be cleared with staff and your advisor first.
Does the team handle BSN placements too?
BSN clinicals in Spokane are arranged by the department, and the staff list includes a BSN Clinical Placement Manager. The capstone is different: students request a setting of their choice with an RN preceptor, and faculty review decides the final placement. See the BSN capstone guide.
Who do I contact if something goes wrong at my site?
Gonzaga's FNP preceptor guide tells preceptors to notify the department's Clinical Coordinator when a problem arises, and your clinical faculty should hear about it too. If the issue could end the placement, bring in the Clinical Placement Team early so a replacement can be approved within the two-preceptor limit.
Related pages
Last checked 2026-09-25
We check these pages against Gonzaga's catalog, FAQs, preceptor packets and Department of Nursing pages. Your course, the Graduate Nursing Student Handbook and Gonzaga's Clinical Placement Team have the final word.
Gonzaga asks you to find local preceptors first. Let us run that search.
Tell us your Gonzaga program, your practicum course and where you live and can travel. We find preceptors who fit the course and prepare the license, certification and site details your Practicum Site Placement Request needs, early in the semester before.
- Preceptors matched to the course: primary care across the lifespan for
NURS 661PtoNURS 664P, psychiatric care forNURS 661MtoNURS 663M, an agency liaison for the DNP - Credentials, license, board certification and site contact ready for your site request
- In Spokane, across Washington or wherever in the ten western states you are licensed
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