| Type | Private Christian university: one residential campus, online programs, and Accelerated BSN nursing sites |
|---|---|
| Campus and sites | Main campus in Phoenix, AZ; Accelerated BSN learning sites (nursing only) in 7 states (AZ, FL, ID, MO, NM, NV, UT) |
| Credentials | Bachelor’s, master’s and doctoral degrees; an online associate in pre-nursing; some certificates |
| Program length | Bachelor’s degrees 120 credits (BSN 123); campus courses 15 weeks, online courses 7–8 weeks; ABSN nursing core in as few as 16 months |
| Accreditation | Higher Learning Commission (since 1968); CCNE (nursing), ACBSP (accounting, marketing), CAATE (athletic training) |
| Federal aid | Yes |
| Founded / status | Founded 1949 in Prescott, AZ. Arizona nonprofit (recognised by the Education Department in Dec 2025); services provided by Grand Canyon Education, Inc. (NASDAQ: LOPE) |
| Facts checked | October 2026 |
About Grand Canyon University
Grand Canyon University was founded in 1949 in Prescott, Arizona, by the Arizona Southern Baptist Convention and moved to Phoenix in 1951. It is a Christian university awarding bachelor’s, master’s and doctoral degrees, and most of its students study online: Grand Canyon Education (GCE) reported 132,354 GCU students at 31 March 2026, 110,406 of them online, and GCU puts its traditional campus enrollment at about 25,000. Apart from the Phoenix campus, the sites GCU lists for students teach only the Accelerated BSN.
GCU was sold to for-profit investors in 2004 and converted back to a nonprofit in 2018; the Education Department formally recognised that status in December 2025. GCE, a for-profit company, provides GCU’s technology, counselling, marketing and back-office services under a long-term agreement in return for 60% of its tuition and fee revenue, and GCU’s president is also GCE’s chief executive.
Programs on campus, online and at the nursing sites
GCU offers more than this site covers, including education, theology, psychology and many graduate degrees. The table shows the career-focused programs listed on this page. Bachelor’s degrees are 120 credits unless noted; tuition is for 2026–27 (online rates from 1 September 2026).
| Program | Credential | Delivery | Where | Prepares for / accreditation | Tuition |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nursing, pre-licensure | BSN (123 credits) | Campus, 15-week semesters | Phoenix campus only | NCLEX-RN; CCNE | $8,250/semester |
| Accelerated BSN | BSN (123 credits in total) | Hybrid: online theory, on-site labs, local clinicals | Learning sites in 7 states | NCLEX-RN; CCNE | $850/credit |
| RN to BSN | BSN | Online | Online | For licensed RNs; CCNE | $345/credit + $120 per course |
| Associate in Pre-Nursing | Associate | Online | Online | Prerequisites only; no licence | $240/credit |
| Accounting | BS | Campus or online | Phoenix; online | ACBSP; CMA exam eligibility | $8,250/semester campus; $490/credit online |
| Business Administration, Finance, Applied Entrepreneurship | BS | Campus or online | Phoenix; online | – | $8,250/semester campus; $490/credit online |
| Marketing and Advertising | BS | Campus or online | Phoenix; online | ACBSP | $8,250/semester campus; $490/credit online |
| Software Development, Computer Science | BS | Campus or online | Phoenix; online | – | $8,250/semester campus; $490/credit online |
| Information Technology | BS | Campus or online | Phoenix; online | Aligned to CompTIA, AWS and Cisco CCNA certifications | $8,250/semester campus; $490/credit online |
| Communications, Advertising and Graphic Design, Digital Film | BA | Campus or online | Phoenix; online | – | $8,250/semester campus; $490/credit online |
| Justice Studies | BS | Campus or online | Phoenix; online | No police academy or POST certification | $8,250/semester campus; $490/credit online |
| Music (five BAs) | BA | Campus | Phoenix | Music Education leads to teacher licensure | $8,250/semester |
| Strength and Conditioning; Exercise Science | BS | Campus | Phoenix | NSCA CSCS exam; NSCA Education Recognition (Exercise Science) | $8,250/semester |
| Athletic Training | MS | Campus | Phoenix | CAATE | – |
| Leadership (MS, MBA/MS, EdD) | Graduate | Online | Online | – | $610–$675/credit (master’s), $760 (doctoral) |
GCU’s nursing college also offers online and hybrid MSN programs in eight specialisations, including family, adult-gerontology acute care and psychiatric-mental health nurse practitioner, plus a DNP; advanced-practice courses cost $760 per credit.
What the main programs cover
Bachelor of Science in Nursing (pre-licensure)
GCU’s campus BSN is 123 credits, 84 of them in the major, taught in 15-week semesters in Phoenix. Clinical work adds up to about 560 hours: 56 in Foundations, 132 in Adult Health I, 60 in Adult Health II, 48 each in behavioral health, childbearing, childrearing and population health, and 120 in a final Transition to Practice course. GCU arranges the clinical placements. Freshmen need a high school diploma and an unweighted GPA of 2.8, or 2.5 with an ACT of 19 or SAT of 1000. The program is approved by the Arizona State Board of Nursing.
Accelerated BSN
The ABSN is for students who already have a non-nursing bachelor’s degree or at least 60 transferable credits. Its nursing core takes as few as 16 months, with theory online, skills and simulation labs at a learning site, and clinicals at local healthcare facilities. Applicants need a 3.0 overall GPA, a 3.25 GPA in prerequisites, HESI A2 scores of at least 80% in math, reading, grammar and vocabulary and 75% in anatomy and physiology, and a background check. There are three starts a year. Students attend labs in person at their site, and GCU provides no housing for ABSN students.
Software Development
The BS in Software Development starts with Programming I and builds through Java and C#, web development, and the Spring and ASP.NET frameworks, with SQL databases along the way. On campus it runs in 15-week semesters; online it runs in 7-week courses. GCU’s BS in Computer Science covers related ground in Python, Java and C++ and has emphases in big data analytics and business entrepreneurship. Students who want a networking and systems path rather than programming can take the BS in Information Technology, which is aligned to CompTIA, AWS and Cisco certifications.
Accounting
The BS in Accounting has 60 credits in the major, including Financial Accounting (ACC-250), Cost Accounting (ACC-360), Intermediate Accounting I and II (ACC-370 and ACC-371) and Financial Statement Analysis (ACC-486). It is accredited by ACBSP and offered on campus or online. GCU’s program page links the degree to eligibility for the Certified Management Accountant (CMA) exam; it does not mention preparation for the CPA exam, so students aiming to become CPAs should check their state board’s education requirements.
Justice Studies
The BS in Justice Studies has 48 credits in the major. Courses include the police function, criminal law, criminal procedure and threat assessment, and the degree can be taken on the Phoenix campus or online. It is an academic degree: it does not include a police academy or POST certification, so it does not on its own qualify graduates to work as police officers. Related options include a BS in Forensic Science, a BS in Law Enforcement Advancement, and an online MS in Criminal Justice.
Digital Film
The BA in Digital Film has 80 credits in the major and three emphases: production, editing and visual effects, and screenwriting. Core courses include Digital Video Production I and II, Cinematography, Nonlinear Editing, Audio Production for Cinema and Television, and Cinema Directing, and the degree ends with a capstone in which students make a short film. It is offered on the Phoenix campus and online in 7-week courses, with the same 120-credit total either way.
Tuition and paying for it (2026–27)
GCU has kept campus undergraduate tuition at $8,250 per semester ($16,500 a year) for 12–18 credits; 2026–27 is the 18th year at that rate. Part-time campus students pay $687.50 per credit, and summer campus courses cost $310 per credit (not for hybrid or pre-licensure nursing cohorts). The Accelerated BSN is charged at $850 per credit, with prerequisite courses at $425. Dual-enrollment high school students pay $210 per course.
Online and evening rates from 1 September 2026 are $490 per credit for most bachelor’s courses ($345 for RN to BSN and $240 for the Associate in Pre-Nursing), $610 per credit for most master’s courses ($675 for business and $760 for advanced-practice nursing) and $760 per credit for doctoral courses. Active-duty, reserve and National Guard members and military spouses pay $250 per credit for undergraduate, $400 for graduate and $617.50 for doctoral courses.
Doctoral students should budget for more than the listed credits. GCU’s own disclosure shows that its 2,341 doctoral graduates from 2020 to 2024 needed an average of 11.2 research continuation courses and paid an average of $52,855 in tuition and fees.
Residence halls cost $2,100 to $4,100 a semester and apartments $3,500 to $4,400 in 2026–27, plus a meal plan with a minimum of $1,700 a semester in the residence halls. GCU accepts federal student aid and offers institutional scholarships for academic merit, transfer students, international students and military students, among others; it says more than 92% of traditional students receive institutional aid. New evening students get 20% off their tuition.
Admissions and schedule
Campus freshmen must be at least 16 and have a high school diploma with an unweighted GPA of 2.8, or 2.5 with an ACT score of 19 or SAT of 1000. Transfer students can bring in up to 90 credits, no more than 84 of them lower-division. Campus courses run in 15-week semesters, online courses last 7 to 8 weeks, and some programs run in the evening. The Accelerated BSN has its own entry requirements (see above) and three starts a year.
Accreditation, oversight and results
GCU has been accredited by the Higher Learning Commission since 1968. Its next comprehensive evaluation is scheduled for February 2027, and in May 2025 HLC accepted a “Special Monitoring Report – Governmental Investigation” from GCU. Programmatic accreditation includes CCNE for nursing, ACBSP for accounting and marketing, and CAATE for the MS in Athletic Training. GCE’s annual report for 2025 said GCU took part in federal student aid under a provisional program participation agreement running to 30 June 2026. GCE’s later filings that we read did not say whether it had been renewed.
First-time NCLEX-RN pass rates in 2025 were 97.05% on the Phoenix campus (296 of 305) and, at the ABSN sites GCU reported, from 90.16% at Sun City to 100% at Sandy, Utah (17 of 17). GCU says its Arizona sites averaged 94.45%, against a national average of 86.71%.
GCU’s September 2026 Student Right-to-Know disclosure, covering first-time, full-time students who started in fall 2019, reports graduation within 150% of normal time of 42% for Pell Grant recipients, 50% for students with a subsidized loan but no Pell Grant, and 65% for students with neither.
Fines, lawsuits and nonprofit status, 2023–2026
- Education Department fine (rescinded). In October 2023 the department fined GCU $37.7 million, saying it had misrepresented the cost of its doctoral programs. GCU appealed, and in May 2025 the case was dismissed with prejudice, with the department stating it had not established that GCU violated federal aid rules (Inside Higher Ed). No fine is owed.
- FTC lawsuit (dismissed). In December 2023 the Federal Trade Commission sued GCU, GCE and GCE’s chief executive over doctoral cost claims, nonprofit claims and telemarketing calls. The court dismissed the claims against GCU itself in 2024, holding that the FTC had not shown GCU was a for-profit “corporation” covered by the FTC Act, and in August 2025 the FTC dropped the rest of the case, which was dismissed with prejudice (FTC statement). No penalty was paid.
- Nonprofit status. The Education Department refused in 2019 to treat GCU’s 2018 conversion as nonprofit for federal student aid purposes, pointing to GCE’s 60% revenue share. In November 2024 a federal appeals court held the department had applied the wrong legal standard; GCU says an IRS audit reaffirmed its 501(c)(3) status in May 2025, and the department recognised GCU as a nonprofit in December 2025.
- Whistleblower settlement. A False Claims Act suit filed in 2018 by a former enrollment counsellor alleged that recruiters were paid or promoted based on enrollment numbers, which federal aid rules prohibit. The relator’s lawyers and press reports in December 2025 and January 2026 said a federal judge in Arizona had approved a $28 million settlement, with no admission of liability. GCE said the Education Department agreed that its current counsellor pay plans are lawful.
- Pending cases (as of GCE’s mid-2026 quarterly report). A proposed federal class action filed in 2024 by former doctoral students alleges the advertised program cost left out continuation courses most students needed; class certification is pending and no trial date is set. A suit filed in 2020 against GCE and three of its officers alleges some graduate degrees did not lead to the state licensure students were promised, and a mass action by about 300 former doctoral students is under way in Maricopa County Superior Court; both are in discovery. GCE says its doctoral representations were accurate and it has not recorded any liability.
Before you enroll
- Outside Phoenix, the sites GCU lists for students teach only the Accelerated BSN. For any other program, students outside Arizona study online.
- Doctoral programs can take longer and cost more than the listed credits suggest: by GCU’s own figures, 2020–24 graduates averaged 11.2 extra continuation courses and $52,855 in tuition and fees. Doctoral cost claims are the subject of pending lawsuits.
- The Associate in Pre-Nursing covers prerequisites only and does not lead to an RN licence, and the RN to BSN is for nurses who are already licensed. The routes to licensure are the campus BSN and the Accelerated BSN.
- Justice Studies is not a police academy and carries no POST certification.
What students say
On Niche, GCU averages 4.2 out of 5 from 11,099 reviews, with an overall grade of B (checked October 2026). GradReports has 1,181 reviews, mostly from online undergraduate and graduate students: 64% would recommend GCU and 67% say their career prospects improved. GradReports ratings vary widely by program.
- Praised: the campus community, dorms and Christian environment; caring, approachable professors; and flexible online scheduling for working adults.
- Criticized: communication with counsellors and advisors and inconsistent information; billing, financial-aid surprises and unexpected charges; and the cost of online programs, slow grading and safety in the neighbourhood around the campus.
Sources
HLC accreditation status · Campus tuition · Online and evening tuition · ABSN locations · ABSN NCLEX disclosures · Doctoral program disclosure · Student Right-to-Know (Sept 2026) · GCE quarterly report, Q2 2026 (all checked October 2026)
Programs & Courses
Nursing
- Bachelor of Science in Nursing (pre-licensure, Phoenix campus)
- Accelerated BSN (ABSN learning sites in 7 states)
- RN to BSN (online, for licensed RNs)
- Associate in Pre-Nursing (online; prerequisites only, not a licensure program)
- MSN, DNP and post-master's certificates (online/hybrid)
Business and Leadership
- BS Accounting
- BS Business Administration
- BS Finance
- BS Marketing and Advertising
- BS Applied Entrepreneurship
- BS Sports and Entertainment Management
- MS Leadership and EdD in Organizational Leadership (online)
Computer Science and IT
- BS Software Development
- BS Computer Science
- BS Information Technology
Media, Design and Music
- BA Communications
- BA Advertising and Graphic Design
- BA Digital Design
- BA Game Design
- BA Digital Film
- BA Commercial Music, Music Production, Music Performance, Music Education and Worship Arts (campus)
Justice Studies
- BS Justice Studies
- BS Forensic Science
- BS Law Enforcement Advancement
- MS Criminal Justice (online)
Exercise Science and Athletic Training
- BS Strength and Conditioning (campus)
- BS Exercise Science (campus)
- MS Athletic Training (campus)
Campus Locations
Phoenix, AZ 3300 W. Camelback Rd, Phoenix, AZ 85017
Phoenix, AZ 2600 W. Camelback Rd, Phoenix, AZ 85017
Sun City, AZ 10484 W. Thunderbird Blvd, Suite 102, Sun City, AZ 85351
Chandler, AZ 4100 W. Chandler Blvd, Suite 100, Chandler, AZ 85226
Tucson, AZ 3500 N. Campbell Ave, Tucson, AZ 85719
Jacksonville, FL 8800 W. Baymeadows Way, Suite 300, Jacksonville, FL 32256
Miramar, FL 2901 SW 149th Ave, Suite 200, Miramar, FL 33027
Lake Mary, FL 605 Crescent Executive Ct, Suite 500, Lake Mary, FL 32746
Meridian, ID 1144 S. Silverstone Way, Suite 200, Meridian, ID 83642
St. Louis, MO 721 Emerson Rd, Suite 500, St. Louis, MO 63141
Albuquerque, NM 6200 Jefferson St NE, Suite 300, Albuquerque, NM 87109
Henderson, NV 2485 Village View Dr, Suite 300, Henderson, NV 89074
Sandy, UT 150 W. Civic Center Dr, Suite 500, Sandy, UT 84070