I can't find anything online about the high failure rate of canadian graduate nurses nclex

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I was lucky enough myself to pass the canadian nclex 2015 but a lot of my co-students have not. I have been trying to get information on what is going to be done about it, if anything and there does not seem to be anyone talking about it online. I have family members that I graduated with that have not been successful and out of the 50ish new graduates the hospital I work at approximately 50% have failed. Prior to the Canadian NCLEX this is unheard of. Anyone know if anything is being done about this?

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IS there a high national failure rate....or is your school in particular having a problem?

Did you go to the NCSBN website? They write the test, so....they may well have what you're looking for: https://www.ncsbn.org/7364.htm

Good luck.

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My school has actually been doing better than the rest. I know in eastern Canada the fail rate has been quite high. Most provinces have now changed thier regulations to allow GN's to continue to nurse if they fail the first time which is new this year. Thanks for the link. I'll check it out.

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Was this spring the first year for Canadian nclex?

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Specializes in Mental Health, Maternity & Well-Woman Care.
Was this spring the first year for Canadian nclex?

I heard that it was. I am interested to hear what differences there might be between tests, other than their names. Was the RPN/LPN examination changed too?

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Specializes in Public Health.
I heard that it was. I am interested to hear what differences there might be between tests, other than their names. Was the RPN/LPN examination changed too?

The PN exam has not changed, yet.

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The nclex started in January of this year for all Canadian students. Unfortunately the university's or most were not up to par with there curriculum for this different exam and I know in eastern Canada people are not doing great. I have been trying to find out stats on this, as well as what associations are going to do about it if anything. Unfortunately I can't seem to find anything on it. The link prior up gives stats on the American side and the. International is bulked together.

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There are a lot of differences. In my opinion. I haven't written the old CRNE however my training of my first three years in my nursing degree was to prepare me for that exam and what I wrote was maybe 35 to 40% of my degree. I was lucky enough to pass but a lot are not and I'm wanting to advocate for them. I was a clerk at the hospital for the last 9 years and foe example pharmacology I'd one of my strong points because of that job. Well I had never heard of at least 70% of the medications on my NCLEX exam. ECG reading is an advanced skill here in Canada and I had multiple ECG strips on my exam as well. A lot of differences

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Specializes in Neonatal Nurse Practitioner.

If there is a high failure rate at first, it's understandable. US school have been tailoring their programs to prepare for the NCLEX for many years. This is very new to Canadian schools. I would expect the the pass rates to rise as the schools adjust to the new test. I'm guessing that the students who started nursing school after the NCLEX began will do much better.

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I agree however I think something should be done for these students who are essentially the "guinea pigs". In Canada we can write three times only than if you fail all 3 times your $60,000 + degree is useless.

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Specializes in Neonatal Nurse Practitioner.

I see your point. Most students in the U.S. use some kind of review (or 3) after graduating before taking the NCLEX. I guess some could argue that we shouldn't have to use NCLEX focused reviews to pass. We should learn everything we need in school. Ultimately, it's up to us to prepare for the test, and we choose to pay for those additional reviews.

NCSBN hasn't published any Canadian specific stats that I could find. They did post the first quarter pass rates for US nurses in 2015 and there was a significant drop in the pass rate to about 81%. I always assumed that this was related to the passing standard being raised in 2014. I'm also considering that the form was not updated to reflect the inclusion of Canadian test takers and the drop could possibly be related to that.

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I'm wondering and worrying about the same thing. Canadian graduate nurses have been thrown onto a test that they have not been prepared for. The NCLEX is not measuring their competence, as their curriculum has not supported this test. What are nurses, schools, and the nursing boards going to do about the sudden and cataclysmic drop in passing rates of the licensing exam?

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