Gaston College Acceptance Rate, GPA, and Admission Requirements

Gaston's Associate Degree Nursing program uses a specific, published point system combining prerequisite course GPAs, science course grades, and entrance exam scores within a defined October 1?March 1 application window each year, with the program beginning the following fall. Students should request the current point-scale breakdown directly from the nursing department rather than relying on older forum posts, since the exact formula and point weights have changed over admission cycles in the past.

Gaston partners with Lenoir-Rhyne University on a Regionally Increasing Baccalaureate Nurses (RIBN) track, offering both a traditional 4-year path (0-25 transfer credits) and an accelerated 3-year transfer path (26+ transfer credits) that combines Gaston coursework with concurrent LRU enrollment. Students should be told explicitly that RIBN requires first being accepted into - and confirming a seat in - Gaston's standard ADN program before applying separately to RIBN; the two applications are sequential, not simultaneous.

RIBN and ADN applicants can apply without holding CNA certification yet, but accepted students must provide proof of a North Carolina Certified Nurse Aide 1 credential - including theory, lab, and clinical components - and be listed on the NC Nurse Aide 1 Registry with a clean record before beginning the first nursing course (NUR 111). Students should plan their CNA-1 training to complete well before their nursing program start date, not scramble for it after acceptance.

For RIBN transfer applicants, Gaston evaluates transcripts at the end of the spring term specifically to confirm the 2.0 GPA threshold needed to start nursing coursework that fall - a defined checkpoint date rather than a continuous requirement. Students on this track should treat that specific spring-term transcript evaluation as a hard deadline for their GPA, not something to fix retroactively.