How Can New Grad RN gain experience to land a job as a RN

estrellaCR, BSN, RN · Jul 15, 2014

Even if they have more resources for large class sizes, it seems irresponsible to be putting out so many new graduates when the job market is unfriendly toward them. This also is happening with lawyers. A lot of law school grads are facing unemployment upon graduation due to way more job candidates than jobs available. At least with doctors they do a residency somewhere before they set up their private practice. BEcause medical students do not come out of med school ready to practice. Same with nursing nowadays. Unfortunately nurse schools are not like the diploma programs where graduates came out being able to go straight into a job. No new grad can be hired and be able to start taking patients with a day or two of orientation.

Schools especially those with large enrollments are all feeding off the "nursing shortage" and pulling all these people in as everyone things once you grad RN school u will get a job right away and you will have many options. Not true. Schools in the area are putting out upwards of 1000 (estimate based on adding all the schools and approx enrollments) new RNs per Year! There is not enough jobs that want to take all these new grads and spend time and money on their orientation. Plus there are new grads from years before with still no job so theres thousands vying for the few positions available.

Education has become a business and not in the best interest of customer (student). Especially the high tuition schools which take many more students and many end up struggling to find employment. Future students should at least know the reality of jobs and not be fed the "nursing shortage" story, which by many students i spoke to thats why they chose to go to nurse school because they were told they will get a job easily. There may be a shortage in rural or far of areas but most people dont want go out of the tristate area or to a far place like NOrth dakota or small town way upstate.

DoGoodThenGo · Jul 15, 2014

Even if they have more resources for large class sizes, it seems irresponsible to be putting out so many new graduates when the job market is unfriendly toward them. This also is happening with lawyers. A lot of law school grads are facing unemployment upon graduation due to way more job candidates than jobs available. At least with doctors they do a residency somewhere before they set up their private practice. BEcause medical students do not come out of med school ready to practice. Same with nursing nowadays. Unfortunately nurse schools are not like the diploma programs where graduates came out being able to go straight into a job. No new grad can be hired and be able to start taking patients with a day or two of orientation.
Schools especially those with large enrollments are all feeding off the "nursing shortage" and pulling all these people in as everyone things once you grad RN school u will get a job right away and you will have many options. Not true. Schools in the area are putting out upwards of 1000 (estimate based on adding all the schools and approx enrollments) new RNs per Year! There is not enough jobs that want to take all these new grads and spend time and money on their orientation. Plus there are new grads from years before with still no job so theres thousands vying for the few positions available.
Education has become a business and not in the best interest of customer (student). Especially the high tuition schools which take many more students and many end up struggling to find employment. Future students should at least know the reality of jobs and not be fed the "nursing shortage" story, which by many students i spoke to thats why they chose to go to nurse school because they were told they will get a job easily. There may be a shortage in rural or far of areas but most people dont want go out of the tristate area or to a far place like NOrth dakota or small town way upstate.

Totally agree with you that on some levels it is unfair, but again nursing programs exist not simply as guaranteed job placement schemes. Also persons will point out just as with say law prospective students should do their homework about choosing a career in nursing before seeking to enter the profession.

Up until the 1980's nursing programs both here in NYC and elsewhere were often wanting for students. At many of the CUNY community college programs you only needed that 2.5 GPA from a pre-nursing sequence and the other qualifications and you were admitted on your first attempt. Perhaps in some extreme instances it may have taken a second, but rarely. No TEAS, NLN, SAT etc... required.

Programs also shut down for lack of students which often lead to a program being on shaky finances. City College shut their BSN program IIRC in the 1980's or maybe the 1070's.

IMHO the problem is not so much the abundance of nursing schools but that suddenly everyone and their mother wants to become a nurse. Sadly reasons range not only out of altruistic purposes but simply wanting a "job" many perceive as steady, always in demand with relative high wages. Problem is that this massive influx of new grads is coming as the healthcare industry nationwide is going through huge upheavals.

New York City has lost something like twenty hospitals in the past fifteen years (or is it fifteen in the past twenty?), either way there are less inpatient beds which translates into decreased demand for nurses. Add to this shorter inpatient stays, a push to community/in home/ambulatory care and you find again the demand for bedside nurses has lessened.

Nursing in NYC is still adjusting to the shockwaves of Saint Vincent's in the Village shutting down. That such a institution was allowed to vanish told everyone in the medical profession/healthcare business we were no longer in Kansas so to speak Nothing is sacred any longer and that there probably would be more closings to follow. Sure enough there were including just last month Long Island College Hospital.

Anyone remotely considering going into nursing today needs to do so with their eyes *WIDE* open. The days of graduating in June and having a job by July if not already hired before are largely over. Just as being able to leave a job on Friday and have a new one lined up by next Tuesday.

It is rough out there and I personally don't see things changing until the large numbers of nurses near fifty or older shuffle off this mortal coil and or permanently retire. What I also see is that unless this BSN mandate from many hospitals reverses ADN programs are going to start going away on their own.

estrellaCR, BSN, RN · Jul 17, 2014

ASN programs are starting to add RN to BSN programs now due to the hiring requirements of BSN by agencies (homecare etc) and hospitals. ASN grads say they went the ASN route to save money however they have to do a RN to BSN program later so I dont know how it is saving money as I heard of many ASNs having more difficult time with jobs than BSNs. Also, I wouldn't say BSN classes lead to better patient care as the BSN classes (meaning those that are not offered in ASN programs) are mostly theoretical and have you write papers and are nothing hands off with patient care. If BSN had more clinical hours than ASN i would agree that a BSN makes a difference. But its not the case, BSN just has more theory classes which dont really translate to better patient care. Btw I am a BSN and those theory and research and "fluff" classes didn't help with clinical skills when I was new on the job.

But it is what it is nowadays and a BSN is needed. ASN programs will have to become BSNs because it is not practical anymore for students to think with an ASN they can get a job and work while they work on a BSN. This used to happen but not anymore. Few ASNs get hired with just an ASN and many ASNs are left having to shell out even more money to go to school again (for BSN) just so they can get their first job.

DoGoodThenGo · Jul 17, 2014

BSN degrees to some extent have always been about "theory", but we aren't going there (again) *LOL*

Yes, it is becoming more and more difficult to graduate with an associates and find work much less an employer to pay for RN to BSN. Suppose if one is willing to move house to an area where ADN nurses are in demand things *might* be different. Otherwise can see little time and or expense saved by not going for the BSN out of the bag and getting it over and done.

Will say when you speak to many considering nursing programs it is the overall academic requirements of four year colleges/universities that put some off. Even CUNY has tightened things up in terms of getting into it's four year colleges. As one has repeated said, nursing programs do not operate in a vacuum. Persons attending a four year program regardless of chosen major are expected to have a certain level of academic chops to handle core and other classes even if they aren't related to nursing per se.

nyc-BSN · Jul 18, 2014

Arguments against the BSN are over as the market has decided that BSNs are the better hire over RNs experienced or not. I graduated in 2010 and landed my first job in a nursing home through an agency in 2012. I did half a year there and absolutely hated it! That ended up getting stuck on my resume as the only experience I had which is probably why I got no interest from employers. I decided that I needed to get my BSN if I ever hoped to get into a hospital so I enrolled into a program and got my BSN within a year since I already had a BS in another discipline. Just before graduating I managed to land a job through my excoworker from the nursing home who had moved on to a top hospital in the city. While I was finishing up my BSN, she told me to drop off my resume one evening, and I met with her supervisor who has a lot of pull in the unit. She told me she would get me in. That informal meeting was in April. After graduating, I had an interview at another hospital that didn't go very well, and I was feeling pretty bummed out, especially since I had a lot of hooks in the organization. That same day, I got a call from my friend's unit manager to come in for an interview later that week. It went so well that she hired me right at the end of our meeting before I left and she told me she would e-mail the recruiter to start the hiring process. It took a month from the interview to actually get a meeting with the recruiter she had e-mailed, and even then I had to initiate the contact with the recruiter via e-mail after waiting for a call from HR for 3 weeks (I had tried to figure out her e-mail through trial and error). Lessons learned? Take the nursing home job to start networking with other nurses and form friendships that go beyond the workplace. Get your BSN. Try to get informal meetings with unit supervisors or managers. Look your best. It's so difficult to get into a hospital with no experience unless you're the best of the best. Very few people are the best of the best, therefore everyone else is your competition and that's why it's so important to have hooks. Jobs don't just fall into people's laps, especially not in NYC. Even if you have all the hooks, you still have to present yourself as if you're competing against other highly qualified candidates, but be humble about it. If you're lucky enough to be hired, don't wait for HR to call you - you must call them, but be tactful. That's what I've learned.

blondie1887 · Jul 19, 2014

Arguments against the BSN are over as the market has decided that BSNs are the better hire over RNs experienced or not. I graduated in 2010 and landed my first job in a nursing home through an agency in 2012. I did half a year there and absolutely hated it! That ended up getting stuck on my resume as the only experience I had which is probably why I got no interest from employers. I decided that I needed to get my BSN if I ever hoped to get into a hospital so I enrolled into a program and got my BSN within a year since I already had a BS in another discipline. Just before graduating I managed to land a job through my excoworker from the nursing home who had moved on to a top hospital in the city. While I was finishing up my BSN, she told me to drop off my resume one evening, and I met with her supervisor who has a lot of pull in the unit. She told me she would get me in. That informal meeting was in April. After graduating, I had an interview at another hospital that didn't go very well, and I was feeling pretty bummed out, especially since I had a lot of hooks in the organization. That same day, I got a call from my friend's unit manager to come in for an interview later that week. It went so well that she hired me right at the end of our meeting before I left and she told me she would e-mail the recruiter to start the hiring process. It took a month from the interview to actually get a meeting with the recruiter she had e-mailed, and even then I had to initiate the contact with the recruiter via e-mail after waiting for a call from HR for 3 weeks (I had tried to figure out her e-mail through trial and error). Lessons learned? Take the nursing home job to start networking with other nurses and form friendships that go beyond the workplace. Get your BSN. Try to get informal meetings with unit supervisors or managers. Look your best. It's so difficult to get into a hospital with no experience unless you're the best of the best. Very few people are the best of the best, therefore everyone else is your competition and that's why it's so important to have hooks. Jobs don't just fall into people's laps, especially not in NYC. Even if you have all the hooks, you still have to present yourself as if you're competing against other highly qualified candidates, but be humble about it. If you're lucky enough to be hired, don't wait for HR to call you - you must call them, but be tactful. That's what I've learned.

I loved reading your story. I am from new jersey and moving to NYC to do my BSN. Like you, I already have a BS in another field, which will def help. However, my RN was from an ASN program like yours. What nursing homes did you look into because I have been having trouble finding nursing homes on sites like indeed in new york. It seems like there are more in nj. I have an interview at a clinic next week which I'm hopeful for. I think new grads need to be more open minded about where they are going to work because the economy is not what it used to be and new york is known to have less openings for nurses from what i've read. I also plan to get my license in nj but their BON is super slow in processing everything so that will likely take me more than 2 months to get.

nyc-BSN · Jul 19, 2014

I got a job in a nursing home through through an agency. Orientation was minimal (less than a week). I was pretty much learning as I went with some very helpful advice through coworkers. However, I dreaded going to work every day, especially on the weekends when it was one nurse on the floor to 35 residents and only 4 CNAs. I just couldn't do it anymore, so I left. Worse is that the facility wasn't using computerized charting or MARs and TARs, which meant signing your initial a few hundred times. I think that's how it is in most nursing homes as many of my friends and classmates shared similar experiences. The point is just getting one's feet wet and meeting other nurses/friends that may be able to help you in the future. The most important thing in getting into a hospital is networking. You may get hired over someone else much more qualified just because you know a supervisor or unit manager. Many of my friends and classmates have done this, and now i can confirm that it's the reality.

SuperwomenRN · Jul 21, 2014

Exactly, that is basically the same thing I have notice others have done on my job search journey. The best way to land a job is network, network, and more network. By doing this it can possible connect you with a manager, recruiter where you can possible reach your target A JOB.

Secondly, by calling HR sometimes you can end up talking to willing party who can give you some helpful hints on what to do. This have also helped me and pointed me in a better direction, instead of appliying all over the place like a stalker with out any response. I landed a agency job by this way ( because nowadays agency are asking for RN experience also), while I do this I will build up my experience continue to network, until I connect with someone. This is NY and you have to be proactive to get what you want, I just got tired of applying and applying then waiting. I am going to do something to get my voice heard...if I made it through BSN nursing school, sleepless nights studying, and studying for the NCLEX; I can make it through this.

estrellaCR, BSN, RN · Jul 22, 2014

Sometimes networking works sometimes it doesn't. I didn't know anyone at any hospital yet I was called in for interviews at several hospitals when I was a new grad and it was all by applying online. And I was also working my first RN job at a clinic before I was hired at a hospital and had taken several certifications on my own (ACLS, NRP, etc). Be open to alternative settings for RN job, being employed beats being unemployed in every way.