The four documents you upload once
Four files go on your profile the week you join. A current CV with employers, dates and the population you saw in each role. A copy of your active state license, both sides if your board issues a card. A copy of your national certification showing the issuing body, the role and the expiration date. And a short practice description: setting, patient mix, daily volume, the EMR you work in, and the days a learner could sit with you.
Program relations reads all four before any school does. The license number goes into the state board's own lookup, so status and expiration come from the board rather than from your scan. The certification is confirmed with ANCC, AANPCB or whichever body granted it, by number and by name. Your CV supplies the dates that show two years in the population after certification. If anything has lapsed, your coordinator tells you before a program sees the file.
The affiliation agreement, and whose clock it runs on
No hour counts until the school and your practice hold a signed affiliation agreement. It sets out insurance, supervision, medical records, student conduct and how either side ends the arrangement. Schools nearly always want their own template, so that is where drafting starts. If your practice already holds an agreement with that school from an earlier student, program relations pulls it, confirms it covers your population, and drafts nothing at all.
Program relations completes the template, names you as supervising preceptor, and sends it to the person who actually signs for your practice. That is an owner in a small clinic, a practice manager in a mid-sized group, or a contracting office inside a health system. From there it sits with the school's placement office. One to two weeks is normal and term starts run longer. You do not chase it. Your coordinator does, and sends you the date it comes back countersigned.
The student's packet, and who signs what
The school assembles the student's file and sends it before the first day rather than on it. Inside are immunisation records, a criminal background check, signed HIPAA and confidentiality training attestations, and the certificate showing the student is covered by the school's professional liability policy. You read it, your practice keeps a copy, and none of it is yours to gather. If your clinic wants its own confidentiality form signed, hand it to your coordinator.
Signatures divide cleanly. Your practice signs the affiliation agreement. The school signs its side of it and issues the liability certificate. The student signs the school's supervision and privacy forms. You sign one onboarding form with NPhours at the start, then the midpoint and final evaluations during the rotation, and those two signatures are also what release your deposits. Nobody asks you to sign an indemnity, a non-compete, or anything that binds your practice beyond the agreement itself.
In order
- 01
Upload the four files
CV, license copy, certification copy and your practice description, once, from your profile.
- 02
Program relations checks them
State board lookup for the license, certifying body for the credential, CV for the practice years.
- 03
The agreement is drafted or confirmed
The school's own template if it has one, or an existing agreement pulled and confirmed current.
- 04
Your practice signs and the school countersigns
Sent to whoever signs for the practice, then back on the school's clock.
- 05
The student's packet reaches you
Immunisations, background check, training attestations and the liability certificate, in hand before day one.
Open your hours and program relations starts the document checks the same week.
Apply to preceptQuestions
Do I need a new agreement for every student?
No. The agreement binds your practice to a school, not to a person. Once it is signed, every later student from that school arrives under it, and only the dates and the named preceptor change. A second school means a second agreement, which is why the first rotation carries most of the waiting and the fifth carries almost none.
My practice has no legal office. Who reviews the agreement?
Whoever signs contracts for your practice, which in a solo or small clinic is usually the owner. Program relations sends the template with a short note of what it commits the practice to and what it does not. If your signer wants a clause changed, the redline goes back through your coordinator to the school.
What is actually confirmed about my license and certification?
Status, number, population role and expiration date, taken from the state board's lookup and from the certifying body's own records. An encumbrance, a lapse, or a certification in a population you are not going to precept stops the file there. You get told what it is, and the file resumes when the underlying document is current again.
How long does this stage take from upload to first day?
Document checks usually finish inside a few business days. The agreement is the long pole at one to two weeks on the school's clock, and longer in the weeks before a term starts. The student's packet arrives once the agreement is signed. Plan on three to four weeks total for a first rotation with a new school.
What if my certification expires part way through a rotation?
Tell your coordinator as soon as you know the date. Most schools require the credential to be current for every hour a student logs, so the renewal has to land before the expiry. Upload the new certificate the day it arrives and the file updates. Nothing already logged is affected.
