Required writing assignments

Lots and lots of papers. Not for the CRNA protion of your degree, but for the "Master's" portion. In our program, they are a pain in the butt. Each semester 30-45 pg papers, preparing for our thesis. (proposal, etc). A lot of research. Then there are the care plans. Not so hard in our program. Those run about 7-10 pages.

Always wondered, why so much writing? When to become a medical doctor you hardly write any papers in medical school and to become an anesthesiologist you don't write many papers during residency. I have talked to some of my NP friends who stated they wasted way too much time writing instead of clinical hands on experience during their graduate studies. However, I have spoke to some SRNA'S who are also NP's who said that the anesthesia programs have much more clinical hours and less writing than their NP programs. I can understand, a couple of research projects and care plans, but some of the classes I will have to take seem ridiculous, such as nursing fundamentals, for goodness sake don't they think we had enough of that in undergrad. nursing? But I have to take the good with the bad, while I chose a MSN CRNA program, it is twenty minutes from my house and I am very familiar with the university and some of the teaching hosptials they use as clinical sites.

I did not do the CRNA program but I did get my masters and wow I was tired of papers by the time I graduated.....

renerian

My program is a Masters in Nursing (MN) not a Masters of Science in Nursing (MSN), therefore we do not have a thesis. 6 out of 7 semesters we have 1-2 papers to write with each being 10-15 pages. For each paper there is also a powerpoint presentation required. Most of these papers are about pharmacology and/or physiology. For two semesters we also have projects with the simulator that require research, demonstration, paper, and presentation on a selected topic.

Lucky you!!!!!!!

I think it depends on the type of program you enter. My program offers a Master's of Science in Nurse Anesthesia (MSNA) rathe than an MSN. We don't write a thesis, and I can count on one hand the number of papers I've had to write after a full year of study (and each of those was 3 pages or less). Our program is based more in the pure sciences rather than nursing theory and philosophy. I'm sure I'll have a few more papers to write as I enter my second year, but from what I've seen here I can't complain at all.

Phoenix

One big paper reporting on your research, 35 pages long in my case and a couple of others scattered throught such as a paper on peds defects and such. Not that big a deal.

WinterMute2
Was the research paper for nursing research, or for an anesthesia course? I have taken nursing research where I wrote a 30 page research proposal. Are you writing papers for the anesthesia courses, or is it for the MSN proportion at the university? I am hoping that come September when I will only be doing didactic that there will not be any major writing projects!

My paper encompased all aspects of my research for NA school. The first 1/2 approx. was developed as part of class/homework in the nursing research class for the program. All papers have been for NA topics, no generic stuff at all.