Baccalaureate nursing students have medium–high levels of competence, and moderate levels of structural empowerment and psychological capital.

Structural empowerment and PsyCap were positively correlated with competence. All the dimensions were positively related with each other.

The linear regression analyses indicated that support of power in structural empowerment; self-efficiency and hope in PsyCap were significant predictors of core competency, predicting 52.8% of the variance in competence.

Structural empowerment and psychological capital contribute to higher competence in baccalaureate nursing students. This study adds to the relatively few studies linking structural empowerment to competence. The results also add to our knowledge of how intrapersonal psychological resources, such as psychological capital, may influence nursing students’ competence.