ACC Spring 2013 hopefuls

nickasarbata · Oct 4, 2012

Good luck to everyone! Emails coming today or tomorrow!! Crossing fingers for us all!!

Savvy.F · Oct 4, 2012

Nickasarbata-I thought the website said within the next week(so by tuesday)? Or do you have further info to why it could be out by tomorrow? If so thatd be awesome!:)

thuynwin · Oct 4, 2012

I was told from my employer learning institute(st.davids is one of the hospitals affiliated with acc for clinical) that acceptance letters will b sent out the first and second week of October. I got a petition for the RNSG skills on Oct. 1. Kind of late. Did any one get one late? Has anyone gotten an acceptance letter yet?

RADIATION_RN · Oct 5, 2012

Good luck you guys!!! I'm two months away from graduating the hybrid RN program at ACC and I used to roll my eyes when people told me that all for levels of the program go by super fast. Now that I am two weeks from graduation I seriously can't believe it is almost over!! It's been a great journey though, nursing school is unlike anything I've ever done. I've loved it!

michellemc · Oct 5, 2012

Hey RADIATIONRN2BE - Congratulations! I've been following this site for a couple of years and have really appreciated all the information you have shared. And I can't believe you are already graduating either. Good luck to you in the future! Do you know where you'll be working?

:)

RADIATION_RN · Oct 5, 2012

Hello! Thanks for the congrats! This last semester is flying by and I can't believe I only have 7 clinical days left EVER!!! LOL! Yay!! I am blessed to have about 4 different job prospects right now. My first choice is the radiation therapy clinic I have been working at for the last 10 years. They approved another RN position for me but right now I am keeping my options open because I want to see salary ranges. I am going to interview with the St. Davids system and Seton system for an oncology position and also travel to MD Anderson to interview for a nurse externship for one of their radiation facilities.

michellemc · Oct 5, 2012

Awesome! Once again, good luck!

thuynwin · Oct 6, 2012

Hey radiationrn2be,I was thinking about taking the hybrid nursing program. I want to know how it was doing nursing online since nursing is hard? I want to do hybrid because I need to work. I can't live off of just taking call at my work. I took a class online once, made an a and it seemed easier. Can't remember what class though, so maybe it was the subject. How is your schedule like? What did you have to do to be in hybrid?

AmyKnows2 · Oct 6, 2012

Anyone receive their actual ranking among applicants yet? I was really thinking we would get them today, since Monday is a holiday. But,... nothing! I know I have at least one or two more application cycles before I get accepted, but would still like to see where I rank based on everyone that applied... It's going to be a long weekend. :0

michellemc · Oct 6, 2012

Monday's not a school holiday, so I think we could still get them on Monday :)

RADIATION_RN · Oct 6, 2012

Hey radiationrn2be,I was thinking about taking the hybrid nursing program. I want to know how it was doing nursing online since nursing is hard? I want to do hybrid because I need to work. I can't live off of just taking call at my work. I took a class online once, made an a and it seemed easier. Can't remember what class though, so maybe it was the subject. How is your schedule like? What did you have to do to be in hybrid?

Hybrid is just a first come first serve basis. When you get your acceptance letter it will say to respond ASAP with your first, second, and third choice of campus. Hybrid usually takes a smaller group, maybe around 30 students max while I believe some of the onsite classes take 40 or 50.

Back when I started in January 2011, level 1 was really hybrid, meaning lectures were given in a live discussion chat room where you had a choice to attend on the computer and listen and ask questions while the instructors lectured. If you couldn't make it, you could always listen to the recording of it anytime later and see the chat dialogue.

I believe they stopped doing that for the semester after me. Not sure why. Lectures are usually never mandatory. I even think the lectures for the onsite campuses aren't mandatory either. Hybrid students are usually self sufficient learners. Like me, I would rather stick knives in my eyes than to sit for 3 or 4 hours through a professor reading word for word from powerpoints when I could be using that time to be working and making money. People are different though. If you are the kind of person who learns best when you hear something read to you, then hybrid does have lectures once a week onsite. The lectures though are typically super fast and condensed. Prime example was OB in level 3. For hybrid, our instructor condensed Normal Newborn, Normal Labor and Deliver, and Normal Pregnancy into one 3 hour lecture. While the onsite guys had one three hour lecture only covering Normal Newborn, then two days later, another three or four hour lecture covering Normal Labor and Delivery.

What I really really liked in hybrid was in level three we had pedi/OB/mental health in five week sessions. So for pedi, we did 5 weeks of one 12 hour pedi clinical per week, and 5 weeks of pedi lecture material. After that, we moved on to 5 weeks of OB along with one 12 hour OB clinical per week, then moved on to the same for mental health and mental health lecture.

Round Rock onsite campus on the other hand split theirs up completely different. They all had the same lecture material together at the same time but their clinical groups were split up. For example, during pedi lecture material, some groups were doing Mental Health clinical first. I would've been so lost to try and learn pedi material for the lectures and tests, and then be in mental health clinical.

Some of the things in OB especially, it really takes seeing it in person in clinical to really grasp the idea.

Level 1 hybrid - a lot of time is spent on campus because you are learning so many new skills that you have to be checked off on. We had clinicals wednesday 0615-1315 and thursdays1300-1900, 6 hours each. They start you off slowly though, just doing clinicals on wednesdays and labs on campus learning skills on thursdays. I don't believe we had thursday clinicals until close to the end of the first 8 weeks of the semester. You also start going to the hospital on Tuesday nights to select and gather info on your one patient around the 3rd or 4th week of the semester. We started with one patient then by the end of the semester you will work your way up to taking care of two patients. We also got to take turns spending a clinical day in OR, and another with the wound care team.

Level 2 hybrid - The first two weeks are really really fast paced and intense, not only are you getting checked off on your level 1 skills, but you are learning all of your IV skills and meds. After the first two weeks we didn't have any required labs. Some clinical groups were the same as level one with wed/thurs 6 hour days. I was in the other clinical group with 12 hour days on Fridays and Saturdays. Some weeks we had back to back 12 hour clinicals and some weeks we didn't. We finished a lot sooner than the other groups since we had our required clinical hours quicker. We also had to go the night before clinical and pick our 2 patients. We started out with two patients and then by the end we were managing three patients. We also got to rotate through the OR and this was the first semester we rotated through the ER also.

Level 3 hybrid - no more going to get patient info the night before! Yay! Pedi clinical is one 12 hour clinical per week (either a wednesday, thurs, friday, or saturday) and you are only allowed two pedi patients. The nice thing is that there are only 5 students per instructor in pedi clinical as opposed to 10 per instructor, because you can NEVER do any skills on pedi patients by yourself. OB clinical is the same, one 12 hour clinical per week (wednesday or thursday) and you start out taking care of two moms on post partum then bump up to two moms and their babies, so technically 4 patients. When you rotate through labor and delivery you typically only have one patient. Mental Health is a free for all and you just meet with patients and play games with them, draw and color with them, and try and pick one to converse with and write your homework on them. We had two 6 hour days, wed and thurs. In pedi you get to pick which specialty you want to rotate through, I had my first choice of NICU, then my second choice was PICU. You also had a choice of pedi ER and OR if you wanted.

Level 4 hybrid - YAY! My group will have some 12 hour clinical days and sometimes have two 6 hour days. Typically though it is just one 12 hour a week depending on which instructor you have. All of the level 4 groups this semester are at Brackenridge. I've rotated through the ER/trauma room a couple of weeks ago and ICU yesterday. CRAZY!!!! And yes, by level four you will be taking care of patients in the ER and doing skills on ER and ICU patients. Of course you are under the guidance of your assigned nurse but it is really a confidence booster to accomplish tasks when pressured. We will be caring for 4 patients on the regular unit by the end of the semester. I am up to 3 and it is crazy at first but manageable.

I hope that helps give ya'll some idea of at least one campus schedule. I typically worked 30-40 hours a week while doing all of this and made A's and B's on the tests, but some students couldn't work as much and still mantain good grades. You will find out real quick how many hours you will be able to work and succeed. Nursing exams are unlike anything you have ever taken before. I have smarty pants students who made straight A's in all pre-reqs and yet they stuggle to get C's on the nursing exams. You can't memorize and succeed in nursing school.

If ya'll have any questions please feel free to post on here and I will answer as soon as I can.

thuynwin · Oct 6, 2012

Thank you so much. Real informative. Had to read it a couple times to actually understand the busyness of your schedule! It sounds like your schedule flip flops week to week. I just hope my employer will understand. thanks again and if i have more questions I will def. Post it!