Well, I was a very average student in nursing school...always barely passing, and flunked one semester after hurricane katrina hit...anyway, i graduated may '07, took 6 months off, scheduled my test for nov. 12th, did some questions out of one book during my free time about a month prior, (very informal, not really studying, more like reading trivial pursuit questions, an REA flashcards in a book), then five days prior to my test I took the saunder's exam on the cd of only the content laid out in detailed test plan, ie client needs, health promotion, etc.....identified each subject that i scored 70% or less in, and then only studied those subjects, where my deficits were, paying particular attention to ALL rationales, even the one's i got right....after covering those deficits a day or two prior to the test, i retook the exam on saunders and had improved my deficits to at least an 80% passing rate.......
i took one day to get back up to par on my dosage cal. and a part of a day to memorize the basic lab values identified in the detailed test plan.....did not study the night before my test, but did kind of skim the subjects of my deficits enroute to the test....i passed my nclex....first try...i'm not a genius, i don't have superior test taking skills, i guess the one thing i am good at is the ability to critically think...and i think that is a part of what made the difference...to me the questions on nclex were much harder than those during school, that test apparently has the ability to very quickly identify your deficits and seems to zoom in on them and i literally felt like i had to pick each question apart as far as what it was asking and what each option was....i got a ton of sata, about 3 or 4 dos. cal.....my test stopped somewhere around 127.....afterwards i felt like i had been hit by a mack truck...lol..very draining....
this forum is a GREAT resource to just read and get moral support from others who are going through the same thing....
the way i studied i do not recommend to anyone...it was a gamble on my part, but i guess my thought was, A) i am not going review all of nursing school, that is just too much and a ridiculous unachievable goal, and B) post-nclex after i found out i passed i realized what i learned in school, i really LEARNED it, i didn't just memorize it, although at the time I thought I did just memorize it...and i believe that is a testament to the teaching skills of the excellent instructors i had, (yes, even the B&%$ches.....i learned from them too!!) and please keep in mind, I was in my last semester when hurricane katrina hit in '05...i lost everything i owned, i flunked that semester literally by 2 questions on the final, I took a year off, came back spring 07, graduated, took another 6 months off...so i literally had Years between semesters 1, 2, 3 and when I finally took the Nclex......I guess now I'm bragging, but I am proud nonetheless my school has a 99 percent Nclex pass rate, so it truly is a testament to the instruction given.....
sighs...should do a commercial for them, haha....
anyway, i'm being long winded...it is 'possible'....but yet it is a gamble...but then life is a gamble...and so anyway that is my 2 cents on this subject....
Nazarite, RN(and still in disbelief
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Good luck!
