Practical Nursing, Vocational Nursing and Nursing Assistants at Southwest Technical College

In Utah, practical nursing programs produce notably varied outcomes, and Southwest Technical College sits in uncertain territory. The estimated $44,134 first-year earnings figure comes from national medians—but that's more than $18,000 above what similar programs in Utah typically deliver. The state's two highest-performing programs with actual reported data hover around $25,000, suggesting the national benchmark may not translate to Cedar City's regional nursing market.

The estimated $11,500 debt load is relatively modest, yielding a manageable 0.26 debt-to-earnings ratio if the national earnings estimate holds. That's roughly 3 months of gross pay, which would be reasonable for a credential designed to get graduates working quickly. However, if this program's actual outcomes track closer to Utah's $25,530 state median, that ratio nearly doubles—still not catastrophic for a nursing certificate, but it changes the value equation considerably.

The fundamental challenge here is that both key numbers are estimates drawn from different sources, creating a potentially misleading picture. If your child can secure information from the school about actual job placement rates and starting salaries for recent Cedar City graduates—particularly where they're employed and at what wages—that would be far more valuable than these proxy figures. Given the $18,000 gap between state and national nursing salaries, local employment outcomes matter enormously for this decision.