Choosing preceptorship - passion or experience?

[AnonymousNursingStudent]

It will soon be time to pick my top choices for my preceptorship and I am not sure what to do. I have an instructor that has taken an interest in me for a unit that would use my full scope of practice (lets call it unit A) and I would get a lot of valuable experience. But there is also a position open on a unit which I am very passionate about, but would use less skills (lets call it unit B). I feel that doing my preceptorship on unit A would be more valuable as experience that's applicable to more settings, but unit B is what I'm what passionate about and where I can see myself long term. This could be an opportunity for me to get a job on that unit, but if I don't then I haven't gotten experience with a broad range of nursing skills other than my clinical placements. Any advice would be welcome, thank you.

[Rionoir, ADN, RN]

I'm in exactly the same boat! My long-term goal is PMHNP, but after doing several interviews and shadow experiences last week I'm leaning heavily towards doing something that will reinforce my medical skills before jumping into behavioral health. My advice is to do a bunch of interviews/shadows and don't limit yourself. When you are in the right spot it will jump out at you.

[Christina_, BSN, RN]

Hi! I graduated recently in May 2019. All of the advices that my coworkers gave me were to not go into a speciality. Many of them told me that it is better to get that background experience because even though you may like that speciality now, you may not like it as much down the road. They also told me that it's best to work on a medsurg unit and then go into a speciality in a couple of years. Just some thought for you ?. If it was me, I would choose A.

[Here.I.Stand, BSN, RN]

It’s hard to say 100% but I was advised to choose med-surg because I wasn’t amazing in clinical, and they wanted my knowledge honed and reinforced to be in the best position for my NCLEX.

It turned out to be great advice! Managing a group of patients clicked, and I even did a respectable job communicating with the dr that all the nurses dreaded calling. It helped a ton with the NCLEX too; I actually only reviewed my notes. I used an NCLEX book from the shelf at Barnes and Noble, but mostly that was to assess myself and assure myself I knew my stuff lol