Your UC preceptor pulled out: protect your hours and replace them in time

Tell your coordinator before you call anyone else

UC's handbook sends all placement communication through your assigned Clinical Site Coordinator, so a withdrawal is theirs to hear about first, and from you. It helps in practical ways too: your CSC holds the agreement with the site and knows whether it covers other clinicians working there.

Keep it to one email: the preceptor's name and site, their last day, the course and hours logged so far, and whether anyone else at the practice might host you. If you're mid-term, send the same facts to your course faculty, who oversee where you stand in the course.

Stay courteous with the preceptor who is leaving, whatever the reason. You'll need their help to close out your records, and they may know a colleague who can step in.

Protect the hours you've already logged

Your hours live in eMedley, where your preceptor verifies time logs through eClas. UC asks preceptors to do that every 14 days, so recent logs may still be waiting. Ask the departing preceptor to verify them before they step away, because unconfirmed hours are hard to count later.

If you've passed midterm, ask your faculty whether the preceptor should also complete an evaluation in eValuate. UC's Preceptor Guide holds back the grade until every hour and evaluation has been submitted, so a missing record can hold up a course even when the work happened.

Then check where you stand against your track's per-preceptor minimum:

• FNP: 60 hours or more per preceptor, with three or more preceptors across the program.
• AGPCNP and AGACNP: at least 80 hours with each preceptor.
• PMHNP: at least 40 hours with each preceptor, and no more than two in a semester.

If the preceptor leaves before you reach that minimum with them, ask your faculty how those hours will be treated rather than guessing.

Before the term or during it

Timing changes the problem. Before the term, you're racing UC's end-of-week-2 cutoff; mid-term, you're racing the end of the semester, since hours count only inside its dates.

If you're mid-term, our page on falling behind on clinical hours shows how to work out the weekly pace you now need.

Finding a replacement UC will approve

The quickest replacement is usually another qualified clinician at the same site, because an agreement with UC may already be in place there. They still need their own Preceptor Application and UC's approval, and they have to meet every rule the first preceptor did.

• Same rules, fresh check. A master's degree or higher, accepted certification, a year in the role, a license in your clinical state, and not a relative or your supervisor.
• Per-semester limits. AGPCNP students are limited to two preceptors per semester, and to a single one in Practicum I without faculty sign-off. PMHNP students are capped at two a semester.
• The NP share. On NP tracks, a certified NP in your own population focus has to cover 20% or more of your hours, and midwifery students need a CNM or CM for half of theirs.
• Midwifery paperwork. Anyone you spend 8 or more hours with needs a full application, and midwifery preceptors send a CV.
• A new site. It needs an Educational Affiliation Agreement, which takes at least six weeks in UC's standard form.

Our preceptor requirements page lists every rule by track.

When a replacement can't be ready in time

Before the term, the line is the end of week 2. Without a secured site, UC expects you to withdraw while the drop date still allows a full refund. Mid-term, talk to your faculty early about what's realistic before the semester closes.

UC's handbook ties its malpractice coverage to semester dates, with an exception for students carrying a satisfactory progress (SP) or incomplete (I) grade. Whether either applies to you is your faculty's decision, not something to plan around unasked. If the course has to move to a later term, read what a delayed clinical costs.

On call when a preceptor drops

Being on call for exactly this moment is built into how we work. Tell us what changed and the replacement search starts right away, beginning with qualified clinicians at your current site, where an agreement may already cover them, then widening to other sites near you that fit your track and UC's rules.

Before suggesting anyone, we check your track's per-semester limits and the NP share, so the replacement fits the plan you already have. Then we help you get the new preceptor's application details together fast, giving your CSC time to review before the cutoff. Your coordinator gives the final approval; we make the file in front of them complete. Tell us what changed.