Methodology
Every number on Program Outcomes comes from a public source, shows its date, and links to the document it came from. When we do not have a number, we say so. We never estimate a missing number or fill it with an average.
The five numbers
- Total cost
- The school's own published estimate for the program: every cost the school lists for the nursing program itself, such as tuition, required fees, books, uniforms and supplies, and licensing exam fees. Where tuition differs, we show the in-district or Texas-resident price first. Prerequisite courses are shown separately, and living costs are never included. Each program page has a checklist of what its estimate covers, because schools define cost differently. When a school has more than one estimate online, we use the newest dated one.
- Pass rate
- The share of first-time test takers who passed the NCLEX-RN or NCLEX-PN licensing exam in a calendar year, from the Texas Board of Nursing's final annual report. Some schools report one rate for several campuses; we note this on the page.
- Grad earnings
- Median earnings of the program's graduates from Texas CREWS, the U.S. Department of Labor's Career Explorer, or the College Scorecard. Small groups are often hidden by those sources to protect privacy; we label them that way.
- Local wage
- The median annual wage for the occupation (registered nurses or licensed vocational nurses) in the metro area, from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. It describes everyone in that job locally, not only new graduates.
- Payback time
- Total cost divided by 10% of the local median wage for the occupation. In plain terms: how many years it would take to cover the program's published cost if one tenth of typical local pay went toward it. It is a simple, comparable yardstick, not a loan calculation, and it does not include interest, taxes, or living costs.
When data is missing
- Not published by the school: we could not find a cost estimate published by the school.
- Data coming soon: we have not finished collecting this number yet.
- Not reported (too few graduates to publish): the source hides the figure for privacy.
- No graduates tested yet: the program is too new to have test takers.
- Small group: fewer than 20 people took the exam, so the rate can swing a lot from year to year.
- Undated estimate: the school's cost page has no date; we show when we last checked it.
How we write "the short version"
The short findings at the top of each page are generated from that page's numbers by fixed rules. A rule only produces a sentence when the data is notable, for example when a program's cost is the lowest in its area or its pass rate differs from the state average. Every number in a finding is checked against our data before the page is published. Wording is chosen by the numbers, never at random, and a program with less to say gets fewer sentences.
How we count cost
The headline cost is every cost the school lists for the nursing program itself, with the in-district or resident price first. Prerequisite courses and living costs are not included; we show what is and isn't included on each page.
Texas and national pass rates
First-time NCLEX pass rates, all programs.
| Year | Texas RN | National RN | Texas PN | National PN |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2025 | 88.6% | 86.7% | 91.9% | 86.6% |
| 2024 | 92.7% | 91.2% | 93.3% | 88.4% |
| 2023 | 91.1% | 88.6% | 92.9% | 86.7% |
| 2022 | 84.3% | 79.9% | 87.4% | 79.9% |
| 2021 | 86.7% | 82.1% | 86.5% | 79.6% |
Publishing standard
A program page is fully published only when it has a pass rate based on at least 10 first-time test takers, plus either a cost estimate from the last 3 academic years (or an undated estimate still live on the school's site) or graduate earnings. Other pages stay visible but are marked as incomplete.
How we group areas
Area pages follow the federal metropolitan area definitions used by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Nearby towns outside a metro area are grouped with the closest one, and we say so on the page.