Change in BSN requirements

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I heard that North Dakota once required a BSN to practice. Can anyone tell me if this is true and why it didnt work out?

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I heard that North Dakota once required a BSN to practice.

Can anyone tell me if this is true and why it didnt work out?

Up until last year ND only offered BSN programs and you had to have a BSN or prove that you were working towards a BSN if you were an ADN that moved here. Our great NDNA and legislature thought that they would "help" solve the nursing shortage if they allowed ADN programs. I personally think it was a step backwards for our state that was the only one to require a BSN. Nursing is a profession-not a technical career. While other health care professions such as PT and OT are moving towards a mandatory masters degree nursing takes a step back.

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Specializes in I don't have much experiance yet..
Up until last year ND only offered BSN programs and you had to have a BSN or prove that you were working towards a BSN if you were an ADN that moved here. Our great NDNA and legislature thought that they would "help" solve the nursing shortage if they allowed ADN programs. I personally think it was a step backwards for our state that was the only one to require a BSN. Nursing is a profession-not a technical career. While other health care professions such as PT and OT are moving towards a mandatory masters degree nursing takes a step back.

You know, I have seen a lot of threads talking about the arguement b/w nurses w/ ADN and BSN. Due to being a student I have thankfully not had the experiance of this, yet. However, I will admit that after reading your post, I was a little annoyed by your degrading comment towards nurses with their ADN :o And yes, I am working towards an ADN. Of course, I will not be stopping there, but that is beside the point. In the state in which I live it has been proven (statistics) that, as far as patient care in concerned, nurses with their ADN is preferred. The reason for this is simple. The main college that most people attend to get their ADN, is considered one of the best in the area. The students get much more hands on learning than any of the colleges that give BSN for nursing. All of the hospitals and most inpatient facilities prefer nurses with their ADN b/c of the excellent care they give to their patients. Of course, when it comes to the supervisor position, mostly all of the facilities want the nurse to have their BSN. Now, I am sure that money does have something to do with this. As you are aware, nurses with their BSN are payed more. However, the nurses with their ADN still make plenty of money.

I know that I can not change your mind, but I still feel the need to inform you that in the state which I live, a nurse with his/her ADN is considered a professional by societal standards. Truthfully, though, if you have taken Ethical Issues in Health Care (requirement for BSN), I 'm sure that you know all nursing, regardless of whether it is ADN, BSN or Masters, is NOT considered a profession. This information is coming straight from the updated textbook. If you need the name, I will be happy to give it to you.

It is a lot more difficult to be accepted into the ADN program than it is the BSN. The reason is b/c, first of all, the student must take their NLN to even be considered for admission. The other colleges do not make this a requirement. Also, the BSN colleges are not as demanding as the others. For example, if I was not to pass two classes whether it be the first semester then the forth, the ADN program will kick me out. Then I would not be able to reapply for 3 years.

Now, I will say that b/c I do not live in ND, I do not know how good their colleges are. So, in turn I don't know what kind of nurses your state puts out. Everthing that I have commented on has been from the prespective of the state which I live in. I have worked very hard to get where I am. Regardless of what a book or another nurse says, I know that I am going to be a professional when I get my ADN. I believe that it is not right for me to put down other nurses just b/c they are a LPN and not a RN with an ADN like what I will have. We go into this profession to care for others, regardless of race, creed, gender, sexual prefrence, etc. How can we do that efficiently if we can not even respect eachother?

I am sure that reading this you will either have a "smart" comeback or you will ignore me all together. And that is fine with me. However, I can not just sit here and let someone degrade me and the rest of the nurses with their ADN. I feel sorry for you, and I hope that someday you will see that nursing is not about what our co-worker has or doesn't have. It is about our patients, and giving them the best care possible.

Jennifer

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Specializes in L&D/MB/LDRP.

i have a BSN, if i had to do it over again i'd get an ADN to start off. in my state the degree doesn't carry any weight, they pay is the same. we don't even discuss if we are ADN or BSN prepared. who cares? now i have a great deal of debt that could have been avoided. yeah i'd eventually like to get into management which my degree is supposed to help me do. i also have learned that those mamagement positions depends on who you know.

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Up until last year ND only offered BSN programs and you had to have a BSN or prove that you were working towards a BSN if you were an ADN that moved here. Our great NDNA and legislature thought that they would "help" solve the nursing shortage if they allowed ADN programs. I personally think it was a step backwards for our state that was the only one to require a BSN. Nursing is a profession-not a technical career. While other health care professions such as PT and OT are moving towards a mandatory masters degree nursing takes a step back.

:angryfire I just graduated from the Dakota Practical Nursing Program at Williston State College and I have never been more pleased with the "technical" education I received. I am quite offended by your "step backward" comment and I can tell you now, compared to the BSN RN students that we shared the floor with my first year of school, we blew them out of the water. This meaning: our nursing skills, assertiveness, communications skills, and our great attitudes and our "jump right in" confidence. Our charting skills were better and our spelling and writing - better! We understood our terminology much better.

We had a few RN students asking us for help with their care plans on one of the floors we had clinicals on! We gladly helped them out and enjoyed working side by side with them but we really knew our stuff and I am proud to say I am a graduate LPN.

There are many diploma nurses out there that have been around a LOOONNG time, can you say the same for them? Does all that extra time taking theory and professional development really improve your "technical nursing skills" that we all have to learn, no matter what route you pursue?

I wondered when I read your post if you were a "new" RN. You are one year in, just as I thought. I hope your attitude changes someday and I hope you never become a clinical instructor because that is just the type of attitude that is detrimental to nursing morale, whether you are and LPN or an RN. Shame on you.

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Up until last year ND only offered BSN programs and you had to have a BSN or prove that you were working towards a BSN if you were an ADN that moved here. Our great NDNA and legislature thought that they would "help" solve the nursing shortage if they allowed ADN programs. I personally think it was a step backwards for our state that was the only one to require a BSN. Nursing is a profession-not a technical career. While other health care professions such as PT and OT are moving towards a mandatory masters degree nursing takes a step back.

Without intending to do so, you have just angered approximately 60% of the nurses, in this country. I began my nursing education at a diploma school. I ended up receiving an associate degree and went on to obtain my BSN. The arugment, concerning the three entry levels of nursing has been on going since before my time. And it will continue because nursing is so fragmented, in its education process. I wonder how many nurses would accept a two year graduate to educate their children or grandchildren? Not many, I venture. Why then, are they so insistent at maintaining a three entry level in nursing. Fear? Lack of funding? Lack of time?

I am not here to debate the value of an associate vs a BSN education. However, I agree with you, we have stagnaneted in resolving this issue. And nothing will change because we generally do not value education, in the way that other professions do. Instead of moving forward, we insist on going along our merry way and continue to complain of how unprofessionally we are treated by other health care professionals.

Grannynurse :balloons:

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while we busy ourselves with this subjective debate, we miss the public's preception of our squabble and fail to define the true problem. we use hasty generalizations to protect our individual egos and degrees. perhaps a way to clear the mudd is to admit we do not have the evidence we need. we must press for real data with actual research and than fearlessly commit to what is best for the profession of nursing.

presently, this debate has only anecdotal proof as to which program makes for a better rn. anecdotal evidence is best defined by a common dictionary.

anecdotal evidence is unreliable evidence based on personal experience that has not been empirically tested, and which is often used in an argument as if it had been scientifically or statistically proven. the person using anecdotal evidence may or may not be aware of the fact that, by doing so, they are generalizing.

for example, someone who is not a physician or other kind of expert might argue that eating crushed garlic and drinking one glass of red wine per day will prolong your life, just because their own neighbour indulged in that habit and died aged 90. it becomes clear that in this case any form of inductive reasoning lacks a broad empirical basis.

similarly, a politician might publicly demand better teacher training facilities just because their own son or daughter happens to have a spectacularly incompetent teacher, or conversely, might insist that public schools are in fine shape just because their own son or daughter happens to have a singularly wonderful teacher.

this is not to say that anecdotal evidence is fallacious per se; it just depends on how it is used. in many cases, it can be the starting point rather than the result of scientific investigation.

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Without intending to do so, you have just angered approximately 60% of the nurses, in this country. I began my nursing education at a diploma school. I ended up receiving an associate degree and went on to obtain my BSN. The arugment, concerning the three entry levels of nursing has been on going since before my time. And it will continue because nursing is so fragmented, in its education process. I wonder how many nurses would accept a two year graduate to educate their children or grandchildren? Not many, I venture. Why then, are they so insistent at maintaining a three entry level in nursing. Fear? Lack of funding? Lack of time?

I am not here to debate the value of an associate vs a BSN education. However, I agree with you, we have stagnaneted in resolving this issue. And nothing will change because we generally do not value education, in the way that other professions do. Instead of moving forward, we insist on going along our merry way and continue to complain of how unprofessionally we are treated by other health care professionals.

Grannynurse :balloons:

I agree with you...and find myself in a Catch 22 when I think about this....I am glad that the option existed to become an LPN, ADN, BSN,etc...I'm currently working on my BSN, and without this option I would have been pretty lost. Went to LPN school, then got ASN, now working on BSN....I was a single mom with new baby when I decided I needed to do something and that's when I went to LPN school....I always knew that I would continue to progress my education, but it wasn't feasible for me to go straight through and get a BSN. The catch 22 is that I agree that nurses have not set themselves to the same standards that alot of other professionals hold themselves to...example of teaches and therapists were good one. Even consider social workers....I know BSW's can hardly find work now b/c MSW's are the standard. I also find it interesting that nurses who have not gotten their BSN's are offended when those who have say that should be the standard. I was never offended....I pretty much agreed...just glad that it wasn't the only option, as real life happens to some of us. I also know from working on my BSN that the level of preparedness for overall broadness of critical thinking is better enforced. I do not think that BSN's are "better" than ADN's, but it is different....and it is more advanced...and it really ties in all the other steps you have learned to this point. It seems the level of critical thinking becomes more indepth with each progression.

Now having said all that, I read a post on here the other day that said something to the fact that each of us individually need to decide what we really want from nursing, where we want to go, and that's the route we need to pursue. It said that it was OK to be an ASN....just don't be mad that you are not a BSN or be mad at BSN's when they point out they have more training...b/c in some aspects they do...if they didn't there would only be one degree. I think we all have something to contribute...we just have to decide what is ....and how far we want to take that...and then we need to be comfortable with that decision.

Kathryn

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Even consider social workers....I know BSW's can hardly find work now b/c MSW's are the standard.

Not a criticism at all, but just a point of history -- actually, up until fairly recently (the last 15 or so years -- to me, that's recent :chuckle ) the MSW was considered the entry level into social work, and all social workers had MSWs. No one expected to get a job in social work with just a BSW; it was understood that the only thing a BSW prepared you for was to get into a graduate program in social work. The same was true in psychology; when you said, "psychologist," everyone understood that you meant someone with a PhD (because no one else bothered to call themselves a psychologist) ... The change was part of the overall push in healthcare to get the job done (or, at least, pretend to get the job done) as cheaply as possible -- organizations started hiring people with lesser qualifications/education because they could pay them less -- which, IMHO, as resulted in a general "watering down" of standards in many areas of healthcare. I hope that trend may be starting to reverse itself.

I also agree that, for all the talk in nursing about us wanting to be taken seriously as professionals, v. few people want to talk about the "900 pound elephant in the living room" (as we say in the substance abuse tx biz ...) -- there is no other "profession" (or any occupation with aspirations of being taken seriously as a profession) for which a community college degree is the entry level ... I'm not saying I support making the BSN the entry level across the board, but the reality is that it is just delusional of the nursing profession to expect that we would be taken seriously as peers by real professions under the present circumstances.

I'm not a big fan of current BSN education in nursing; I've been involved in recent years in several different ADN and BSN programs, either as a full-time faculty member or an adjunct/guest instructor, and, from what I've seen, I seriously worry for the future of nursing ... My diploma school did a much better job back in the Dark Ages (actually, it was the early '80s) of preparing me to function competently as a entry-level Registered Nurse, including critical thinking skills, ethics, legal issues, and "professionalism," than any of the programs I've had experience with since then. (Of course, I realize there were plenty of poor quality diploma programs around in the old days, and I was mostly lucky to have found myself in a really good school.)

And what's up with so many people flunking boards nowadays?? My state BON newsletter recently reported that several good, solid, respectable nursing programs (at least, I thought they were :uhoh21: ) in my state are on probation with the board because they have NCLEX pass rates of 70%, 67%, 56%??? Clearly, somethin' ain't right ... It wasn't that long ago that schools (not to mention the BON) considered it a crisis if their pass rate dropped below the high 90s (%) -- at my school, if the rate had ever dropped below 99% or 98% (once in a while, one of the graduates wouldn't pass), the faculty would have all committed ritual seppuku out on the front lawn to atone for their (obvious) failings ... Now, taking the boards multiple times is apparently considered some sort of "rite of passage," and the whole thing seems to work like some weird lottery (as a poster on another thead noted recently) -- eventually, you get lucky ... (Please note that I blame the schools for this phenomenon much more than the students -- I'm not crticizing students for this).

I apologize for sounding like one of those bitter old battleaxes (I always wince when I do, because, when I was a student, I always swore that I would never be one of those nurses who says, "Back when I was a student ...") I certainly don't claim to have all (or any!) of the answers. But it does seem to me that we've thrown the baby out with the bathwater in several different aspects of nursing, and I believe nursing education is one of those areas. I don't blame any particular individual(s) or group for this, but it seems like there's something seriously wrong with the system -- but we're all too busy being warm and caring and supportive of everyone to really take a objective look at what's going on with nursing and its future. I hope I'm not too far off-topic, and I apologize if I am.

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And what's up with so many people flunking boards nowadays?? My state BON newsletter recently reported that several good, solid, respectable nursing programs (at least, I thought they were :uhoh21: ) in my state are on probation with the board because they have NCLEX pass rates of 70%, 67%, 56%??? Clearly, somethin' ain't right ... It wasn't that long ago that schools (not to mention the BON) considered it a crisis if their pass rate dropped below the high 90s (%) -- at my school, if the rate had ever dropped below 99% or 98% (once in a while, one of the graduates wouldn't pass), the faculty would have all committed ritual seppuku out on the front lawn to atone for their (obvious) failings ... Now, taking the boards multiple times is apparently considered some sort of "rite of passage," and the whole thing seems to work like some weird lottery (as a poster on another thead noted recently) -- eventually, you get lucky ... (Please note that I blame the schools for this phenomenon much more than the students -- I'm not crticizing students for this).

Agree....I was really surprised to read just on these boards how many people had taken the NCLEX multiple times....

but we're all too busy being warm and caring and supportive of everyone to really take a objective look at what's going on with nursing and its future. .

Totally agree....

Kathryn

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Specializes in Community Health Nurse.
Without intending to do so, you have just angered approximately 60% of the nurses, in this country...................................

Grannynurse :balloons:

:yeahthat: :smiley_ab :angryfire

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Quote:

Originally Posted by grannynurseFNP

Without intending to do so, you have just angered approximately 60% of the nurses, in this country...................................

Grannynurse :balloons:

:yeahthat: :smiley_ab :angryfire

Why does this bring out our anger instead of our problem solving skills. I do not see winner or losers...just registered nurses who must confront a professional issue involving education. What are we afraid will happen if our educational track become standardized. When can WE as a profession come together to find a professional solution? As long as this debate continues we will have CEO's who say silly things like "nurses should marry better to have better pensions".

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