New Grad...No job and have no clue what to do

Well, I wish I had better advice for you but I don't. I live in Nebraska and was hoping to find where to look for a job in Colorado since I have applied just about everywhere here in Nebraska. I hear Arizona and possible Texas have jobs for new grads. I thought my LPN experience would help me but, just like you, I have been applying for months with not a single interview.
BTW, congrats on your license. I have faith that sooner or later you will find a great job. But sooner is always better than later, isn't it?

Hi Nurse 901!

I should say from the start but I live now in NJ ....but it's not my fault! (lol)...I come from several generations of Colorado families - I'm looking to relocate to Colorado again, and so I'm going to post a question about this right after I answer your question.

...I am a trauma nurse in a busy inner-city hospital in New Jersey. It was my first job - I've worked there fourteen months, right out of school into the ICU. I took me six months to find a job as a new grad, in a state with the most number of hospitals per capita in the whole country. I was beginning to think I would never find a job, and i was looking in the most disappointing of all avenues, desperate for work.

What I learned got me a great job: I started finding out all the classes that hospitals have to place new grads in before they can hit the floor - it costs, at least here in NJ, about $40,000.00 for a hospital to hire and train a new nurse!!! So I set out to not be such a liability to a hospital...I discovered which hospitals opened their internal training classes to outsiders (for a fee, naturallly), and took everything I would need as a nurse, and them some (since I wanted Critical Care)...I had to drop more money out of nursing school (the big downside), but I was then a lot more "hire-able", and less of a liability, during job interviews. It's hugely impressive to nurse managers, and it makes you less expensive, so the hospital realizes you "COST LESS MONEY" to them as a new nurse. Start calling and taking all the courses: IV Access, BLS,....it all depends on what you need, or what position you want. I added ACLS, Critical Care Nursing, Hemodynamics and Shock Monitoring, in short, anything I could get a seat in, I took. Try this approach, and let me know how you're doing! Good lUck

About how much did these classes cost, individually and all together? What an interesting idea. I've planned on getting BLS this summer, but I didn't know the other classes were possible.

The critical care class I took cost a few hundred dollars, plus my pay (of course.) It's not a bad idea for a newbie to look into taking this course for themselves. Not bad at all...