Advice needed about lateness

caroladybelle, BSN, RN · Oct 30, 2003

Originally posted by Nursie30
No job is going to make deals with you about your tardies, neither will your nursing instructor, they expect you to be prompt and that is that.

I have to agree with the above statement.

PlanetCaroline · Oct 30, 2003

You will never guess what happened.

Before I had a chance to talk to my clinical instructor about the unreliability of public transportation, she told us that she understood occasional lateness b/c it may happen to her b/c the commute is very long. One car accident on the highway & she won't be on time either. She said to call ahead if we were going to be late and that we could make up the time. I have no interest in abusing her flexibility policy and showed up for clinical early & all of us stayed a few minutes extra. I plan to stay a few minutes late at clinical most of the time, so I think it is fine that I might be 10 minutes late ONCE b/c the train broke down.

At the clinical site I overhead a nurse manager talking on the phone to one of the nurses and was saying, "Get here when you can. I am glad you are okay. We'll take care of things from here."

Turns out... MANY NURSES DON'T EAT THEIR YOUNG!!! The rehab hospital looks pretty & organized and I am looking forward to learning there.

I think I am going to be happy at my clinical site & it was worth getting up at 4 am, I now I want to go to bed. :zzzzz

Caroline

Originally posted by LydiaGreen
Do whatever you have to do, just don't be late. I'm not trying to be mean to you or anything, but the other students in your group will be mad if you are late for any reason. One of my classmates was late once a week, three weeks in a row. Each time, our instructor was big time p.o.'d, but it got worse with each occurrence. Her tardiness was taken out on the rest of us. Being late reflects poorly on you as a professional, and on the instructor as well. The problem with tardiness is that the registered nurses working on the floor will not want to be told, "oh you have to care for this patient for twenty minutes because Susie Q. Student is late". It makes things bad all around for everyone concerned. Trust me, do whatever you have to do.

francine79 · Oct 30, 2003

I'm glad that worked out for you Caroline. I have to commute from a small town to a city. Even though it isn't the size of NYC, I still sometimes have problems getting to class on time. They are rebuilding the interstate that goes through the middle of the city. And it can really cause alot of problems. I know detour routes, and I exit as soon as I see traffic backing up, but as you would know, sometimes you can prepare in advance but you can still be late.

I think it's impractical for some to say do whatever you have to do to get there on time. The ONLY way to ensure that is to never leave when you get there the day before or to leave your house 3 hours early. To me, that is just silly.

I believe that depending on the situations going on where you live, for instance the dependability of your public transportation or where I live the whole interstate being restructured, most instructors are understanding. However, if you are attending school in a small town with no commuting problems they would probably be less understanding.

My clinical instructor expects our assignments from clinical to be due the next day by 5:00 p.m. I discussed with her that I live out of town and we worked out a deal to where I can turn mine in at 8:00 a.m on Friday when I will be on campus next.

Sometimes I think instructors forget that we have other responsibilities than just being a student. So it never hurts to ask for some help.

I'm glad you have an instructor who understands.

Good luck!

LydiaGreen · Oct 30, 2003

Sorry that you don't agree with me Francine, but as I explained, I have seen how this situation was dealt with by my instructor.

I am glad that your instructor is so understanding Caroline, that's great, I know mine wouldn't be. Because I know that she is not understanding, I am always a half hour early for clinical. Always being a half hour early means that I have that half hour to reread my notes on my patients, or having that leeway in case something does happen with my transportation. I realize that you can't leave a half hour early because you already take the first available ride but, I was not being rude. Only telling you what has happened in my clinical group. It wasn't pretty. I wasn't even the one who was late but by the end of each of those days, I was ready to quit because the instructor was so over the top angry and took it out on EVERYONE.

nurse2be in ny · Oct 30, 2003

That's got to be a load off your mind, Caroline. Glad it worked out!

Nursie30 · Oct 31, 2003

The rules where I went to school were written in stone: If you were even 1 minute late for school, that was a tardy, 3 tardies counted as 1 absence. 5 class room and 3 clinical absences were allowed, anything over that you were out. No excuses. Assignments were promptly turned in by 8am, not one minute past. I arrived on time went to my desk, pulled out my assignment, my instructor was talking to someone else, I was trying to hand her my assignment, when she was finished talking with them, she turned to me and said, I hope you know it is late. When it was handed back to me, there was a big fat zero on it and she had written how wonderful of a job I had done and it would have probably been 100% but it was turned in late.............That is why I said do whatever it takes to get there on time........I guess some instructors are more understanding than others mine weren't.

Mandylpn · Nov 4, 2003

The more I hear, the more I realize my school is not the only boot camp on the planet. We have students who leave class early and skip and that is "okay" but late for clinicals is a "no-no", go figure. :chuckle