My name is Melissa and I graduated almost two years ago with summa cum laude. All through school, I studied for tests and if I put in the time studying, I got really good grades without a problem.
However, the NCLEX has been a different story. I have now taken it three times and I have recently registered to take it a fourth time, but it's getting really difficult to stay motivated. I have done kaplan, virtual ATI, worked with a tutor here in the Kansas City area, and done thousands of questions. I've gotten to a point where the thought of picking up a book again is sort of depressing. Most of the people I graduated with are pursuing graduate degrees now and I'm still trying to pass this test.
Quite frankly, it's very lonely, and i think it would be SOoOo helpful to find other people who are in a similar situation. Sometimes, walking down a path that feels daunting can feel way less daunting if you can do it with other people.
Has anyone else found themselves failing multiple times and come close to giving up and then passed? Any suggestions?
You graduated with a 4.0 GPA and can't pass the NCLEX? According to what you posted you have done "everything" and still can't pass and want to quit. I think you should quit. You are stating you have done all the classes...studied...4.0GPA.. Yet you can't pass the NCLEX. What more can you do? If failing the NCLEX 3 times doesn't motivate you then what will? I have no idea.
Anyone reading this post and "freaking" out can relax. I got my BSN in 2006 and my class had a 99.9% passing rate. And those all first time. I didn't even study just did a couple practice exams. My GPA was ok...3.5. I am not a brainiac by any means. The people who barely graduated and the ones who rocked it....everyone but one person passed first time.
I suggest taking the hurst review if you haven't and you are struggling with content. It's a 3 day overview of basically everything you learned in nursing school and comes with 6 NCLEX style practice tests. I also recommend taking as many practice questions as possible and reviewing each rationale! Leading up to my NCLEX exam I took about 2000 questions.
I think your problem at this time is beyond "test taking strategy". Perhaps you don't really know the content you once learned in nursing school. There is no way to relearn all that was presented in nursing school. Doing lots of practice questions and full length tests should help you pass. But again, perhaps you just don't know most of the content of what you were taught in nursing school. After graduating, I bought one Princeton review book, and that was sufficient for me to pass the NCLEX the first time. And no, I did not graduate with honors, and my GPA wasn't even close to 4.0.
Specializes in Pain, critical care, administration, med.
I took my NCLEX a long time ago 3 times. It's all about just answering the question. Read just the question and then retread the scenario. It's where most people get caught up. The second thing is to understand the rationales. Go back and study the content of what you got wrong. You can do it its all about studying correctly not over studying stuff you don't need to even know.
Kaplan destination tree won't work if you don't know content
Hmm...I didn't always know content, due to the fact there are questions in the NCLEX about obscure meds and such; what helped was understanding WHAT the question was asking, which helped me break down WHY the question is correct.
OP and others, HOW are you studying?
The issue may not necessarily the source of the review, but how one approaches the NCLEX itself: understanding the four concepts of becoming a competent, entry-level nurse:
1. Safe, effective care;
2.Health promotion;
3.Physiological Integrity;
4.Psychosocial integrity
Will determine WHAT the question is asking you; the question may be Respiratory related-but is it a Health Promotion or a Safety, or a Physiological or a Psychosocial one? Would you know the difference and choose the BEST answer?
Once one understands the concepts of NCLEX, they can do so successfully.
Don't look at content; you know most of the material because you passed nursing school; begin to do questions related to each concept; review all questions and rationales; ANY rationale you struggle with, THEN review content. Lather, rinse, repeat.
When practicing the questions, prepare the questions like a mock NCLEX exam, review the minimum and then work up to the maximum for endurance purposes.
Review rationales and identify what is your weakest NCLEX subject, THEN work on those questions. Saunders and Lippinicott and others have questions broken down in the subjects-if you need to focus on the subjects then work in questions in that manner, review rationales-if you don't get the rationale, then look up the source to study the info. NCSBN is great in having the setup that I described; I find that to be one if the better programs out there when the questions are very similar to NCLEX, have rationales with sources to the information if one needs to study the subject.
So I struggled while I was in nursing school.. I worked my ass of to study for exams and still did not do as well as I had wanted or expected to do. However, I never gave up and you shouldn't either. If nursing is what you really want to do, then you need to work as hard as you can to accomplish that goal.
Anyways, I just took my nclex this past Friday (July 10) and I graduated May 30th with my BSN. I was terrified to take nclex, but I had no choice so I purchased Hurst and did the review online at my own pace. After the lectures, I did the practice exams scoring anywhere from 70-85/125 questions. I also purchased the NCLEX RN Mastery app for my phone so I could do questions while I was out-waiting in line, at work on my break, in the car, etc... About a week before my exam, I bought the Kaplan qbank online and worked through many questions on there (very similar to nclex style questions!). I made sure I read the rationales and that I understood before moving on.
Today, I found out I passed nclex. My computer stopped at 78... I had tons of priority questions, 20 SATA, no math, one or two meds.... Bottom line, you NEED to know how to delegate, and who your priority clients would be out of a selection of 4.
Just at keep doing questions, but make sure you UNDERSTAND the rationales and content!
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Kaplan destination tree won't work if you don't know content