Why Is It So Hard To Get Into Nursing Programs If There Is A Shortage For Nurses???

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Why Is It So Hard To Get Into Nursing Programs If There Is A Shortage For Nurses??? Then you have schools that only accept 30 students a semester. It's so frustrating.

I believe any healthcare program is competitive because you will directly or indirectly be tampering with the lives of patients. The program can't just let anyone in. They want the students that have proven that they can follow direction and retain information. I know I wouldn't want a nurse taking care of me if he/she slipped by with D's in their undergrad work!

Why is it that people were able to get into Nursing school with a 2.5 just a few years ago?Thats not the reason.I think a 3.55 GPA is excellent,but I got rejected three times.Like most people said,it has to do with the fact that there are more students than there are instructors.

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I chose to go the expensive route. Sitting around waiting for cheaper schools to accept me was not an option. Are you only applying to the cheaper schools (ex. CUNY) or are you also applying to schools like SUNY, Beth Isreal, LICHSON, etc.?

That is true.The expensive schools accept more students since they have more instructors.Suny and Cuny tuition are around the same amount.I applied to Beth Israel but did poorly on the Verbal part of the exam.If I had done better,I think I would have made it in.

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There was actually a report on this and the main reason is that they can only have a small number of seats because they lack the nursing faculty to actually teach the students. CUNY schools have only about 5 or 6 professors in their nursing department so they can only take in so many students and they have a policy where they must allow seats for transfer students.

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70,000 graduates take the NCLEX in the Philippines, and only 24,000 PASS?!? In the US, the success rate for first-time NCLEX takers is about 85% the last I heard, last year. And according to what's in the quote above, only 34% pass in the Philippines.

How scary is this to anyone?

:typingSorry to mis lead you.. that 70 thou are nursing students who took Local Board exam here not NCLEX (but if you look at it, it's the same.). 24 thousand of that are now registered nurse, BUT dont have the opportunity to practice what they learn because of what????

No JOB VACANCY HERE!!!! :banghead:they all think that once you graduate and pass board exam that's it, the opportunity is jst around. But in reality... It's hard to get a job without experience... :sniff:

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:typingSorry to mis lead you.. that 70 thou are nursing students who took Local Board exam here not NCLEX (but if you look at it, it's the same.). 24 thousand of that are now registered nurse, BUT dont have the opportunity to practice what they learn because of what????

No JOB VACANCY HERE!!!! :banghead:they all think that once you graduate and pass board exam that's it, the opportunity is jst around. But in reality... It's hard to get a job without experience... :sniff:

Oh gosh,where do you live dear? These people should come to New York.A job position is almost guaranteed after passing the NCLEX.

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It is funny as I was reading this thread a commercial came on talking about the nursing shortage. From my experience there are not enough instructors. There are people willing to teach but at some of the area colleges here they want the instructors to be either working on or have a PhD and the pay is not great either. So that cuts out a lot of people that would do a good job at teaching. And also at my school they want the clinical instructors to have a master's degree! We usually had clinicals at a large area hospital but because of the new masters requirement we had to go WAYYYYY out in the county to a hospital there for clinicals. It was funny because the nurses there were asking us why are so and so school student nurses having clinicals out here? I know there are standards and this may not be the case with every school but wow.

Also not everyone should be a nurse. The schools here that I have checked out require a 78% for passing. And don't beat me up but if a person is getting D's and C's in their pre-req classes then maybe they should reconsider nursing. Because the nursing classes IMO are a LOT harder than the pre-req classes.

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Specializes in Ward,Er,Or.
I believe any healthcare program is competitive because you will directly or indirectly be tampering with the lives of patients. The program can't just let anyone in. They want the students that have proven that they can follow direction and retain information. I know I wouldn't want a nurse taking care of me if he/she slipped by with D's in their undergrad work!

having low grades on college does not reflect the care you give to patients the care you give is based on experience i tell you i have a friend who is @ the top of our graduating class but idk why he still taking the local board that i passed 3 years ago :saint:

yes they say there is shortage of nurses but the quality of nursing has declined greatly because of to many students they dont get to experience hand's on how to take care of patient because when i was a student it 1 is to 1 ratio from student nurse - patient but now with the 15 students to 1 patient i dont see all of them learning something maybe that is why its hard to get in now

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:typingSorry to mis lead you.. that 70 thou are nursing students who took Local Board exam here not NCLEX (but if you look at it, it's the same.). 24 thousand of that are now registered nurse, BUT dont have the opportunity to practice what they learn because of what????

No JOB VACANCY HERE!!!! :banghead:they all think that once you graduate and pass board exam that's it, the opportunity is jst around. But in reality... It's hard to get a job without experience... :sniff:

Thing is, even though you meant 24K of the 70K took the Philippine licensing exam instead of the US NCLEX, it still doesn't look so hot for Philippine nursing schools to only have a 34% passing rate (for licensure) for their graduates! I would think, honestly, that the Philippine exam would see the highest number of graduates become licensed that is possible. And all they could get to pass that test was 34%?

I wonder of those 24K, how many of them would be able to pass the US NCLEX-RN?

REALLY not impressive. No shortage of schools, it seems, but definitely a shortage on quality schools. Looks like the schools are churning them out as fast as possible, regardless of the quality of the graduates they produce.

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Specializes in Oncology/Haemetology/HIV.
Why is it that people were able to get into Nursing school with a 2.5 just a few years ago?Thats not the reason.I think a 3.55 GPA is excellent,but I got rejected three times.Like most people said,it has to do with the fact that there are more students than there are instructors.

You might have gotten in with a 2.5 GPA, but that didn't mean that you passed classes and continue.

Even for nonnursing degrees, many state schools will accept low GPAs for admission, but about the time those students take a few classes, or get put in one of the 100 or more students in a lecture hall courses, they will rise or fall. Many fail out in a few terms.

Please note my previous post as to how many people started with me in nursing school, and how many actually passed the program. I do not recall the required GPA for admission.

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Specializes in Oncology/Haemetology/HIV.
Oh gosh,where do you live dear? These people should come to New York.A job position is almost guaranteed after passing the NCLEX.

As the poster is referring to the Philippines, it is possible that the poster is from there.

As such, passing the NCLEX would not guarantee a USA job, as retrogression is in place. They cannot just come to NY to work, but must get a working Visa/GC and that takes substantial paperwork and several years at best.

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Nursing programs also have an incentive to limit the number of grads to artificially create a shortage, thereby making nursing jobs so lucrative. The same thing happens with med schools.

If that didn't happen, and there was an adequate number of nurses out there, then obviously average nursing salaries would fall, making becoming a nursing instructor a more desireable position. Seriously, most college nursing professors probably get paid well and have good benefits, so I don't see why people are complaining about having to teach in the first place. Its only because of a shortage/high salaries that people think teaching at a school that has full benefits, a steady salary and a retirement plan is a bad thing.

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Why Is It So Hard To Get Into Nursing Programs If There Is A Shortage For Nurses??? Then you have schools that only accept 30 students a semester. It's so frustrating.

A lot of the programs I've seen are in metropolitan areas like Houston, Dallas, e.t.c. They get filled up really fast b/c of competition. The schools basically up the GPA requirements, get strict on the course requirements, e.t.c to weed out the overcrowded lineup of students.

I would say it's hard to get into nursing programs in metro areas. It's a little easier if you try getting into programs in less populated areas.

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