Spring Arbor clinicals in Tennessee: what to check first

01Tennessee at a glance

SAU's single nursing state list, read September 24, 2026, authorizes Tennessee. The exclusions are Arizona, New York, Louisiana and Alabama, and Alabama sits on Tennessee's southern border, so keep your search on the Tennessee side if you live near that line.

The course numbers are taken from SAU's 2023-24 catalog. Confirm them in Brightspace before you plan around them.

02The 2026 moratorium bill

The bill in question is SB 2013/HB 1905. Once law, it would put T.C.A. 63-7-501 through -506 on the books and pause, for two years, the board's handling of applications from nursing schools headquartered outside Tennessee, whether they want to run a program, enroll Tennesseans or send students to Tennessee clinical sites. Pre-licensure, RN-to-BSN and APRN schools are treated alike.

A school that already held Tennessee approval before the effective date keeps it, but has to hand over requested data, preceptor lists and placement figures among them, to the board and the Tennessee Center for Nursing Advancement. By June 30, 2027, that Center is due to propose standards for outside schools that rely on Tennessee preceptors and clinical sites. Official enactment is unconfirmed; one secondary source dates it to April 27, 2026.

What this means for you: whether SAU holds, or needs, Tennessee approval is a question for SAU. Ask the program director directly, and get the answer before a preceptor spends time on your paperwork.

03Restricted practice and preceptor leads

AANP's label for Tennessee is restricted. Every NP there works under a physician's supervision, and prescribing in Schedules II through IV carries caps, including on how much opioid can be supplied. Physicians can precept SAU's NP students, so the supervising physician is someone you can ask directly.

Ballad Health, Erlanger, Methodist Le Bonheur Healthcare, Covenant Health and Vanderbilt University Medical Center are the big systems, spread across the Knoxville, Memphis, Chattanooga and Nashville metros. Begin with SAU's own leads: volunteer providers the program director can name, and sites that already hold an affiliation agreement with SAU.

04Incentives and licensing

Tennessee's hospital association runs a state grant-funded Nurse Preceptor Incentive Program, but it counts students from accredited Tennessee programs and from schools in seven named nearby states. Michigan is not among them, so a preceptor of an SAU student should not expect it.

Multistate licenses have been valid in Tennessee since the compact launched on January 19, 2018. One issued by Tennessee or by your compact home state covers RN practice here and meets SAU's catalog rule on licensure in the practice state. Details are on our RN license page.

05Why Spring Arbor students in Tennessee choose us

While the moratorium question is open, confirm SAU's standing first and search second. Once you have that answer, we hunt for Tennessee preceptors who fit your track and ready the paperwork well ahead of the four-week mark. Approval remains a faculty decision, and your file gives them all they need to make it. Talk to the placement desk.