RN New Grad- can't find a job!

U.S.A. California

Published

Hi all,

Newbie here. I graduated last month and have been applying like crazy and can't seem to land a job. :oAny suggestions? I'm beginning to think my IP is worthless. I plan on taking my boards sometime next month. Any tips on studying for the NCLEX?:specs:

Thanks all!

Specializes in Med Surg, Telemetry, Long Term Care.

just had my interview in ucla last friday.two people interviewed me.one was in ccu and the other one was in cardiology stepdown..the one in ccu told me that if i'll get hired,i'll be expecting a call for him next week.I dont know what are the chances that i'll get hired.The floor asst manager on cardiology stepdown who interviewed me told me that my experience as a student nurse in the philippines will not me help me in the cardiology stepdown unit.They dont want to teach a new grad from scratch.well,life goes on.Im not expecting that she will hire me but I hope that i'll get hired at ucla.I dont want to wait for july to apply again.

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StarBelly

I think I'm a little confused by your post... are you applying for a BSN at Samuel Merritt and Sac State? Well if you are I can give my response... I just graduated Samuel Merritt in May. It did take me a while to get a job, but I was finally hired at Stanford in the CCU/CSU and have been working about a month. Most of my classmates who applied while still in school had jobs when they graduated, although not all of the jobs started right away, generally speaking between June and September. However, not understanding the urgency for looking for a job, and having just delivered a baby, I choose to wait to start applying until after I had passed my NCLEX. So I did not really start looking for a job until July. It is true that it is not so easy to get a job as a new grad, but once you do get your foot in the door somewhere you have great opportunities. My recommedation is that if you want to be a nurse then start school... to be honest no one knows exactly who will be hiring and in what quantities in two years, however, I still believe that there is a shortage of experienced nurses (hint the reason why no so many new grad programs and tons of positions available for the experienced nurse... they can't train you if they don't have the people to do the training). Anyways if you want to be a nurse I say go for it... once you get a job you will make enough to pay back the loans and my advice apply for as many scholarships as you can.... the majority of my schooling was paid for through scholarships and the loans that I took out were used soley for living expenses. Good luck and let us know how your journey into nursing is going.

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Nursejenni08:

Congradulations! on graduating from SMC, having a baby, and getting a job!!! That's incredible! :balloons:

I really want to work at Stanford, actually, so it's funny you should mention getting hired there. :bowingpur

What department did you get hired in, and why do you think they hired you? What kind of experience did you have that led you to being selected at Stanford?

One other question for you, if you don't mind...How did you like SMC? Did you do their regular Bachelor's or Accelerated? Which campus were you at?

I have applied to the SMC accelerated program. I'll let you know how it goes. I'll take your advice and apply for scholarships. I'd prefer SMC because I'd like to find work in the bay area.

thanks! and good luck with everything.

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StarBelly:

Well I got hired in D1 that is CCU/CSU. One one side is the :redbeathecardiac ICU which takes care of Critical Care Caridiac Medical Patients... meaning before transplants or after transplants in rejection etc... but not right after surgery, they have another unit that takes care of those patients.. and the CSU is an Intermediate ICU that takes care of heart patients that need continous monitioring, again these are not right after transplant, but we will get post transplant pts especially if they are in rejection or if they are having other issues after being discharged home from their transplant. If you get hired in this unit you get cross-trained on both sides.

:anpom:I really think that I got hired at Stanford because they are looking for people who's goals are pt. safety as well as customer satisfaction. They obviously number one think that pt safety is key but they also value the pts opinion on how they feel they were treated and if their care givers were knowledgable and competent. :nmbrn: I have heard (but don't quote me) they prefer to hire those with BA's but it does not have to be a BSN it can be a bachelor's degree in something else and an AS degree in nursing. As far as prior experience, my previous career was in waitressing/managing restaurants, so I do have ALOT of customer service experience, as you know I graduated from Samuel Merritt with BSN (and just a side note Samuel Merritt College, I have found, has an excellent reprutation and many hospitals prefer to hire SMC graduates). I did not have any clinicals at Stanford nor did I do a preceptorship there (But if you are interested in Stanford I recommend that if you have the opportunity that you do clinicals there if offered and definately request to have a preceptorship there (of the 9 new grads that were hired in OCT, 3 had their preceptorships there as well as some clinical rotations, and 2 of those 3 worked as NA while going to school). But I had excellent recommendations from preceptors and clinical faculty, and of couse good grades (they ask for a copy of your transcript). Really I think it is important to be honest in your interview and not come off as a know-it-all. They want to know and feel confident that if you did not know something or needed help that you would ask. And lastly, I think they just look at personality to see if you would be a good fit in the unit.

As for SMC I liked it. It was not perfect, but as I have a lot of friends in nursing schools all over CA, I know that there is not one perfect school. Benefits of SMC are: great scholarship opportunity, every spring they have a scholarship application that you fill out, it is very easy and get recommendations from clinical faculty, and that application qualifies you for all of their scholarships, my last year there I recieved about $9,000 just from that one short, easy, application. On top of that they had given me an entrance award that I continued to recieve each year as long as I remained in good standing. There are also additional scholarship opportunities throughout the year. Another great part was that the instuctors as well as anyone else that you needed to communicate with inclunding the Director of Nursing ect. were always accessable and approachable. Some negative aspects, were some people were not happy about their precptorship placement or had some dificulties with instructors, or did not like the clinical placements, but really in my opinion, those are issues that people could encounter anywhere, so to me its just life and no big deal... No matter where you go to school you are at the mercy of the school... I really think that SMC really tries to accomadate the students and I feel that they accomplished what they set out to do which was prepare me to be an entry level nurse.

So I went to the Oakland campus and was in the the BSN program.

Good luck to you:caduceus:, I hope you get accepted. But no matter where you go, stick it out, it is worth it in the end. Oh and one more suggestion that we wish we would have done in school, as you go through your clinical rotations, as you find nurses that you click with get their contact information, they could be good resouces for future jobs opportunities as well as references. Keep me posted.

P.S. I love working at Stanford, everyday is a new and challenging experience and I look forward to each day and leave happy and full of energy.

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Hi NurseJenni08

Thank you for your informative response. I'm so excited for you and inspired to finally get in the clinical setting. I did hear that SMC students have more clinical experience than State students, and more hospitals are apt to hire on SMC students over State as a result.

I'm very grateful for your advice. I have started a file on getting a job, and your post will be entered there for reference.

Enjoy your new job and baby! I hope to get to meet you one day when I'm doing clinicals at Stanford!

~Lisa

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Specializes in icu.

im feeling so bummed out right now. I passed my nclex last nov 14 so just like every new grad, Ive been applying to different hospitals here in good ol' SD.. still, no call backs.. no surprise there-what must an inexperienced nurse hope for anyway? now, for desperate move, i listed all the nsg homes and ask them for any job opportunities,so tomorrow, off i go to check my luck,..

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I interviewed at John Muir WC two weeks ago, and was told that they had just under 400 apps for 3 new grad positions. I didn't get in there, but I'm still hoping for a Christmas miracle (a job). 8 million residents in the greater SF Bay Area, but where are the nursing jobs? I've applied to 25 hospitals in the last month, and I keep being told that no one is hiring new grads.

Nursing Shortage? Yeah right, Bah-humbug

The Grinch works in hospital HR!:angryfire

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MBA2RN

I'll be praying for you MBA2RN!!! good luck! I hope you find a job from

Santal :christmastree::gift:

I'm a bit nervous about getting a job 2010 when I graduate:cool:

where did you go to school?

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I'm graduating from Samuel Merritt's ABSN program next week. I started sending out resumes and putting in apps about two months ago, to try and land a spot in any of the local new grad programs starting early next year. So far, all I've been told as that they are either canceling new grad programs or severely curtailing their new grad hiring.

It took hard work to get into nursing school, and hard work to complete nursing school. I guess it's going to take more hard work to get that first nursing job. I'm confident it'll happen...it's just going to take hard work and time.

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CA actually received funding to get more students thru nursing school in anticipation of the nursing shortage that will be coming when many of us retire, but there aree also many more staying in the field right now that would have retired because of the economy.

The Bay Area is one of the worst areas in the country to find a new grad program and get hired for it. The programs that offer one, usually only have it two to three times per year, and they take 12 -15 new grads on average. With the shear number of graduates in the area, it is impossible for them to all get jobs in the area.

If you have two years of current work experience, then it is easy to get hired in most cases.

I still see foreign nurses post on the International Forum that are focusing only on CA and quite a few for the Bay Area and they get angry with me when I tell them that they are not going to get hired and I am sure that I called every name in the book as well. But when an American that trained in the area cannot get hired, why is a hospital going to petition a foreign nurse? Just not going to happen.

You may wish to enlarge your search to a smaller area perhaps in the central valley to try and get hired and at least get some experience under your feet.

Best of luck to you.

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Specializes in med-surg.

I am also a new grad nurse with experience as an vn who cannot get a job. I was overconfident because i work at a hospital registry not staff.:coollook::cry::scrying: I had to resigned because my hospital could not get me a job. i used to have at least a vn job now the hospital policy was to get RN a job within 90 days,or resign. my 90 days passed and i had to resigned with no rn job.

I think we need to stop having a pitty party and start writing letter to the Governor and OBAMA ask them to stop importing nurses while we cannot get a Job in USA as nurses. :argue::argue:I wrote an email to some tv station with no answer. Please together we can find solutions.

I put myself in debt going to school to better my life and now ironically i lost my job because i went to school. Thank you SANTA CLAUS. i guess you not coming again this year to my place:angryfire but the bill collector will still come . I will keep my head up and Hope alive.

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While I would LOVE to have more recognition of this problem (licensed nurses who can't find jobs) in the media--I'm so tired of hearing the other story about the nursing shortage and how we need to educate more nurses, which persists even in this area--the problem is not that the jobs that would be going to new grads are going to foreign nurses instead. We aren't going to win any credibility points trying to play that card. Also, there are still areas of the country where it is easy for new grads to find jobs, so it isn't that new grads can't find jobs "in USA"--I know there are lots of people who can't leave the area for one reason or another, but that's not the same thing as not being able to find jobs in the USA.

Good luck to everyone who is job-seeking. I know you never thought you would be in this situation as a nurse.

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