Rutgers vs Kaplan NCLEX reviews

Hi,
If you can get Saunder's Questions Review and do a lots of questions everyday(if you can )especially before your NCLEX-RN , like 250 a day....I went to Kaplan review courses I did not enjoyed so much ...than as well I got Q-bank from them as a student you get like half a price discount ,but I it was not enough for me but than I got Saunder's ....I got it ..I pass from the first time ( I graduated form outside US school ) so you can do it even easier
Good luck ....

i am in the same sitiuation right now.
planned graduate from nurs school 12/16/08

+rutgers pro's
nurses actually teach the class, so if you ask a question the answer will be from a person with a MSN or higher. Leo Felix Jurrado actually teaches the cardiac lecture. if you are farmilar with NJ board of nursing then you know he's the head of the board.
there is review of material, if you like review they offer lots of informational packets adn handouts. so if the stuff you learned first year is a little foggy it's good.
if they get 25 students to sign up price breaks from 379.00 to 325.00
if they get 18 students will be at county college of morris at night twice a week, close to where i live.
the woman running it is very very accesable, gave her email/home.cell phones#'s out.

-rutgrs con
more expensive than kaplan
less practice questions
if you don't need the review it's a LOT of matierl to review
may not be close to home if don't get 18 students


+kaplan pro's
cheaper than rutgers
money back guaranty if you fail
good test taking strategies-ie desc tree, what to look for in test

-kaplan con
proctor of class not an RN/MSN/PhD so can not offer any other perspective other than NCLEX strat.


have to decide by dec 5th so wish me luck, send me good vibes out there fellow future RN's and NCLEX takers! i am leaning tward kaplan b/c of the financial factor. cheaper and money back guaranty.
i am mailing out my application to the board this week.
it's all happenin so fast! ahahah 3 years of planning/sacrifice/hard work. man i can't believe it's almost over.
now if only the economy would turn around and there would be more jobs for new grads.
sigh.
back to work.

Hi,I took kaplan last yr.but wasn't successful.I just wasted money for that.I would suggest that you get the saunders comprehensive review and make use of suzanne's plan.It really works for me plus it's free and all your time is yours.

NCLEX is not a matter of what review center you took,but rather a mastery of your concepts.You just have to managed your time for review and make use of 1 particular book only.

GOODLUCK.......

Hi Iris: I'm what you'd call "a weaker" type new grad, so i think my experience might help you.

I signed up for Rutgers Revu, after talking to nursing faculty who said it had "the most" in terms of review content. This was true, there was ALOT of it, but I can't say any of that helped me with NCLEX. Save your $350, and stick with one or two review protocols. For example, I used Saunders (4th edition) and MedsPub, and I truly believe that THOSE things are the things that helped me pass NCLEX, on first attempt, with under 90 questions.

Devote at least 4-5 hrs a day, ensuring you do at least 100 questions a day. I also did NOT remediate on the questions I got wrong by going back to source (text book) material. What I did was to ALWAYS read the rationales and strategies for ALL 4 ANSWERS to every question. That's where alot of the learning takes place.

Hope this helps you.....but really, you probably don't need a review course. I was a weaker student, passed it first time, but the Rutgers Review did NOT really factor into my successful passing of NCLEX.

Its really interesting reading your responses! As for me, it was mandatory that our class took a Kaplan course and I can say that it really really helped! I find kaplan questions to have the same style as NCLEX questions and the strategies really worked... I had bought the Saunders Comprehensive Review and found Kaplan RN Review book to be more useful if you need a quick review...

I took rutgers review class. Like atrex mentioned above, you can take the class if you need to brush up on content but in terms of strategies and how to answer nclex style question, it does not really help. I failed nclex because i went into the exam with knowledge (content) and not critical thinking skills.....i would suggest getting saunders comprehensive and doing suzanne's plan....info can be seen on nclex forum stickie. i wish you the best

I think I might be too late in replying, but I took the Rutgers Review and I think it was a good refresher that sums up all the practical information, but I don't think it was very helpful. It just helps with your knowledge base.

For me, what really helped (and I hope i found out about this before) was the online review questions from NCSBN. They are the ones making NCLEX and the questions on that review are VERY similar to the actual NCLEX questions. It's only about 40 dollars to access it for a month. https://www.ncsbn.org/175.htm One of the questions I had (I took it in July 08) was actually one of the review questions!

i am actually in teh Kaplan class.
in hindsight i wish i had opted for the 'online only' course.
in person is a complete waste of time.

the woman leading the class is nice, however she directs you to 'look that one up' when asked for further explanations.

also a side rant. you have to go at the pace of your classmates. a lot of whom will agonize over the answer/rational and how impossible it is when it relates to the realworld.
it's like OK< we get it...in the real world this blah blah blah. but you're wasting everyones time crowing about how this would never be applicable in teh real world!



i want to tell these people get over yourself you're wasting time focusing on problems rather than solutions!!! gah
/endrant

sorry i'm just stressing right now.
good luck to all those going to take the exam!

my buddy who i went to nursing school with who took Rutgers said the 5 hours of review was draining and didn't have the energy to do questions afterword.

also two last comments on kaplan.
1) they have out dated questions. i have had two questions asking for Grains to Mg's.
2)the diagnostic exams they make you take on entrance and completion of the coures are pencil and paper...like what the...??? why do this? it's almost a regression. Why not offer the diagnostic/exit tests on computer at the center to mimic the NCLEX as much as possible.

bak to doing questions.

-a

i took rutgers last oct-nov 08 and it was a success, they offer a free review if ever you fail...
though i havent tried kaplan but i knew that kaplan dont have a class room type of teaching unlike rutgers , nursing prof were the one teaching and its like you're back to school type of teaching then they also have a website for the computer Q/A's which is included in the program and a booklet that you will use as the discussion goes. i highly recommend it because it really did worked 4 me... GOD bless,,, you can do it...work hard plus prayers===100% passing rate