I'm an ADN nursing student in a community college (of course).
I'm in my last semester.
Here is the breakdown of my education thus far:
Semester 1, geriatrics rotation. Teachers didn't know they were teaching until days before. Given wrong syllabus and then finally got syllabus 2 weeks later... still from 1 year ago.
Semester two. We're in the hospital now. We get to pass meds. We're essentially given our own patients. We have access to the pixis except for narcs. We aren't really shown how to do assessments... we review it briefly in lab and then we have our own patients. We aren't shadowed by a nurse, we don't follow a nurse. Clinical labs are a joke. We're shown something once, and then passed, even if performing the task in a mediocre or poor manner.
Semester three. We can now do IVs, IV meds, IV pumps. Oh, ya... we don't have a pharmacology course in our program. Being consistent, we're shown once how to turn on a pump in lab and then we have our own patients. IVs: we demonstrate how to do an IV on a manaquin arm that has a vein the size of a pencil bulging out with a large hole already in it from the hundreds of previous sticks... pop the iv in once and we're turned loose. Instructors are often not present on the clinical floor working on the Master's degrees homework. Instructors for labs are often disorganized because they usually don't know they are teaching them until hours before.
Semester 4. We're told we would get our clinical assignments in August. Then mid August. Then end of August, then two weeks after that. 50% of the staff had just quit. We often have deadlines that are not met. We complained about this in semester two and were told we need to deal with it, because that's what professional nurses do, is learn to adapt.
My last rotation is in ICU. I somehow lucked out and got a nurse that actually shows me what I'm supposed to be doing. I've learned more in these few days than my entire education to this point. Many other students will not get a nurse like mine and will graduate behind the curve.
Other local colleges require you to demonstrate skills a few times in lab before they pass you. Not mine. Other local colleges actually have a nurse-preceptor for clinicals. Mine technically does, but they usually have their own patients and are off doing that while we practice... um... nursing?.... The clinical instructor is usually off in random rooms, or are studying on their own. They are available should we need them. I can't help but feel that we are students and shouldn't be left to figure it out on our own.
We are NLNAC accredited... not sure how... I'm wondering what I should do. Having a nurse show me basic clinical skills I should have learned a year ago makes me think we're producing unsafe nurses. And many in my class think the same. The program is disorganized, things change on a whim of whoever is in charge. Information is often not known by all the faculty. Staff often finds out late that they are teaching and produce learning material from the previous year, and dated from the previous year. Nothing is stable or solid, we have come to expect random changes. Schizophrenia is the basis for our program.
I would approach the leadership but there is an atmosphere of fear and retaliation. One of the top instructors has outright said she hates conflict and doesn't deal well with it... and has dealt with student that do. People that have spoken up in the past get 'dropped' from the program for various reasons.
People who technically fail a semester are passed on. Students have failed two semesters and are passed on. Apparently 3 is the limit as shown by students who had to drop for failing 1st, 2nd and 3rd semesters. What is the point of having a 75-83 be a C if you're going to pass students who fail.... and why curve it up for students who are actually reading their books and not hoping to get passed on...
The only thing I don't get is complaining about the curriculum being a year old. I don't know of anyone that expects instructors to write up new teaching plans every semester, or even every year.
I can see how the hospital and clinical rotations are disheartening. I would hope there is some sort of lab, or instructor available to practice skills outside of class time.
The problem is not that the curricula is a year old. The problem is that the instructor teaching it often doesn't know they're teaching it until 1-2 days before. An unprepared instructor is usually not a great one, let alone a good one. Stumbling, fumbling, reading out of the book.
I know what we are not getting. There are 10+ nursing programs in a 100 mile radius. Mine is the worst. I see what students can do, what they're learning. They actually have someone teaching them clinical skills in clinicals... imagine that. To take an unexperienced student RN who you push pass on through clinicals, and assign them a few patients, and call it good is simply not safe nursing. If we complain, we get dropped. I could see it if it were structured that we were shadowed by an RN first in 2nd sem, given more scope in 3rd sem, and left alone in 4th sem with counsulting the floor instructor and staff RNs when necessary. Yet, when you go into 4th sem with 0 clin skills, fear of teachers, and you find based on having a serendipity's chance and get a great RN that will teach, because none thus far have, even the ones we're paying to do so, then there is something wrong.
Beyond the lessons being a year old, which I hardly care about, the SYLLABUS' have tended to be. It's a bit hard to plan a schedule on last year's calendar. Then passing people who fail 3 times? In this program that's bad... I suppose the NCLEX may be the weed out factor there. My current clinicals in the ICU are only a month. I will suck up as much as I can while I can. Our clinicals thus far have been 8 hours twice a week for 4 semesters. There have been many many times where I have had no patients. Many times where I just sat at the nursing station because my clinical instructor was off doing something else/ the floor had only a couple of pts and the staff nurses just didn't care. Even when assertive we're simply told no.
Such is life I suppose. Yes, we all learn as new grads. There is a distinction however. Many new grads in my area will be competent new grads. That is the difference.
The problem is not that the curricula is a year old. The problem is that the instructor teaching it often doesn't know they're teaching it until 1-2 days before. An unprepared instructor is usually not a great one, let alone a good one. Stumbling, fumbling, reading out of the book.
I know what we are not getting. There are 10+ nursing programs in a 100 mile radius. Mine is the worst. I see what students can do, what they're learning. They actually have someone teaching them clinical skills in clinicals... imagine that. To take an unexperienced student RN who you push pass on through clinicals, and assign them a few patients, and call it good is simply not safe nursing. If we complain, we get dropped. I could see it if it were structured that we were shadowed by an RN first in 2nd sem, given more scope in 3rd sem, and left alone in 4th sem with counsulting the floor instructor and staff RNs when necessary. Yet, when you go into 4th sem with 0 clin skills, fear of teachers, and you find based on having a serendipity's chance and get a great RN that will teach, because none thus far have, even the ones we're paying to do so, then there is something wrong.
Beyond the lessons being a year old, which I hardly care about, the SYLLABUS' have tended to be. It's a bit hard to plan a schedule on last year's calendar. Then passing people who fail 3 times? In this program that's bad... I suppose the NCLEX may be the weed out factor there. My current clinicals in the ICU are only a month. I will suck up as much as I can while I can. Our clinicals thus far have been 8 hours twice a week for 4 semesters. There have been many many times where I have had no patients. Many times where I just sat at the nursing station because my clinical instructor was off doing something else/ the floor had only a couple of pts and the staff nurses just didn't care. Even when assertive we're simply told no.
Such is life I suppose. Yes, we all learn as new grads. There is a distinction however. Many new grads in my area will be competent new grads. That is the difference.
Sorry, I misunderstood. Having no schedule to work with is stupid, and it is going to make planning out studying and practicing skills difficult. I wasn't trying to minimize what you were going through, I am more miffed when people (*cough* textbook companies) think that curriculum changes so frequently.
Wow! I would say OMG too. I DO now how you feel, with that spirit of fear and retaliation going on. It seems to be in almost all nursing programs, and I don't know why!! Make use of the instructors after class maybe? Be persistent with checking their availablity and let them know unequivocally that you there to learn, not just be "passed over". I hope that helped.
Have you looked online to see what the NCLEX passing rate is for your school? Maybe you should have researched this nursing program before you entered it. Hang in there, and study your nursing books on your own as much as you have time to. Fortunately, when you take NCLEX, you will not be taking the test on a "real patient" and won't have to perform clinical skills. A lot of this you will learn when you start working as an RN. Right now, concentrate on your critical thinking skills, not so much on your "hands on" skills. BTW, way back when I was in college, we had no mannequins, we did IV's and stuff on each other! Ouch!
Oh yeah, we also did not have a separate "pharmacology" course; it was incorporated into all of our other nursing classes. Your's may be like that, also.
if it is as bad as you say then how in the world will you pass your Nclex exam? Have previous students passed the exam? If so then they learned something because its NOT an easy test. You should have taken this bull by the horns after your first semester and transfered to another school. This sounds crazy
"a student nurse can hang an iv, she cannot hand blood in any way shape or form."
also not true, and for the same reason. she cannot be the one who signs for its matching, because she is not licensed to do that, but she can certainly participate in the process as an active observer and do the check along with the two rns, and then spike the bag and hang it, monitor the patient, and all else, as a student under the supervision of a registered nurse. i was a preceptor for a student for four months in a cardiac surgery icu (btw, what a great program she was in that had her do that, she worked 32hrs/wk at my side on my schedule, whatever it was) and believe me, i made sure she did this a lot.
Specializes in psych, addictions, hospice, education.
When I said I thought it was illegal for a student to hang IVs, I said it because the way the OP wrote things, it seemed she was saying she was doing it without supervision, without a staff member or her instructor being there. There are so many problems with this. She said they started one on a mannequin and then were turned loose. That's not adequate training.
When I said I thought it was illegal for a student to hang IVs, I said it because the way the OP wrote things, it seemed she was saying she was doing it without supervision, without a staff member or her instructor being there. There are so many problems with this. She said they started one on a mannequin and then were turned loose. That's not adequate training.
often that's the training, on a mannequin. You learn by doing on real people, that's the reality, as most things in nursing, you learn on the fly with other nurses present.
I've worked with some of the new grads from my school. One, on Telemetry PCU didn't know what cardiac tamponade was. Seriously? A 1 year in, new grad, telemetry PCU nurse doesn't know what cardiac tamponade is?
Why didn't I leave 1st sem? Because I was ignorant. I hear people complain about all nursing programs really. Obviously, many are much more strict, require much more work, and allow zero absences. Not mine. There is good and bad in all I suppose, though it should not be the culture of our education. I'm miffed because I am now aware of the statistical spectrum bell curve of quality nursing education, and we are an outlier, several deviations to the left of the median.
I chose this program because it is accredited (NLN must take bribes), and because there was no wait list. Just competition based. All other programs in my area are wait list based. 2-5 years for an ADN program. Crazy. 3-4 years for the Accelerated BSN program for previous degree holders. I will be finishing in the time, or twice the time, I would be waiting.
I got in my first attempt to this program. 54 students out of 500ish applicants.
Other than being NLN, there is little information on my particular school. Its rural and other than pass rates there is near zero info on the school.
Specializes in Electrophysiology, Medical-Surgical ICU.
I'm sorry you are going through this, your program sounds absolutely awful!!! I am in my last year of my AND program and graduate May 2012(YAY!!!) and my program is nothing like this. Just about every skill th at we do in clinical we learn in lab and are tested on and if we don't pass the skills test we are kicked out of the program and have to wait a whole year to return, you fail more than once and you are kicked out for good! Are clinical instructor pretty much monitors everything we do while passing meds and everything else. We have a pharm class (use to have 2 but the 2nd one got "incorporated"in the 3rd semester). And I have seen people and personally know people that are repeating their med-surg rotation again for failing lecture by 0.33 points(need 74.5 to pass)! I'm glad my school has those standards. And is very organized they have a set of instructors that only teach 1st year students and do their clinicals(we had our own pts from clinical 1, but again everything is monitored), and then they have the clinical and lecture teachers for year 2 only that teach the more advanced skills and such!! I like top think in my program only the strong survive!!! I hope you have better day during your last semester in NS school!! God Bless
ohmg
33 Posts
The problem is not that the curricula is a year old. The problem is that the instructor teaching it often doesn't know they're teaching it until 1-2 days before. An unprepared instructor is usually not a great one, let alone a good one. Stumbling, fumbling, reading out of the book.
I know what we are not getting. There are 10+ nursing programs in a 100 mile radius. Mine is the worst. I see what students can do, what they're learning. They actually have someone teaching them clinical skills in clinicals... imagine that. To take an unexperienced student RN who you push pass on through clinicals, and assign them a few patients, and call it good is simply not safe nursing. If we complain, we get dropped. I could see it if it were structured that we were shadowed by an RN first in 2nd sem, given more scope in 3rd sem, and left alone in 4th sem with counsulting the floor instructor and staff RNs when necessary. Yet, when you go into 4th sem with 0 clin skills, fear of teachers, and you find based on having a serendipity's chance and get a great RN that will teach, because none thus far have, even the ones we're paying to do so, then there is something wrong.
Beyond the lessons being a year old, which I hardly care about, the SYLLABUS' have tended to be. It's a bit hard to plan a schedule on last year's calendar. Then passing people who fail 3 times? In this program that's bad... I suppose the NCLEX may be the weed out factor there. My current clinicals in the ICU are only a month. I will suck up as much as I can while I can. Our clinicals thus far have been 8 hours twice a week for 4 semesters. There have been many many times where I have had no patients. Many times where I just sat at the nursing station because my clinical instructor was off doing something else/ the floor had only a couple of pts and the staff nurses just didn't care. Even when assertive we're simply told no.
Such is life I suppose. Yes, we all learn as new grads. There is a distinction however. Many new grads in my area will be competent new grads. That is the difference.