Contacting Interview Panel

Hi guys,

I wanted to know about the likely hood of a person getting hired as fresh out of college with a msn but no bsn as I am deciding which program and degree to pursue.

So, I thought it was a good idea to contact some of the major hospitals in my area to get a feel of how they feel about hiring entry level msn students.

For all of them I pretty much emailed the general email address provided on their site and requested some statistics, FAQs or be forwarded to the proper person/department (hoping it would reach HR or one of the manager nurses) in hopes to address my question. However, out of the dozen hospitals, most responded by saying they do not forward information to the recruiting party.

This really sucks. I was really hoping I could meet with someone simply to discuss the outlook of my future.

So my question to you guys is, how do I approach this situation. Is there generally a person at a facility I could reach out to and have an open conversation with or is looked down upon and I shouldn't even have emailed the hospitals. (Even though I think it is a clever idea to reach out and do some research).

Thanks

My understanding of your questions is that you're looking at MSN as an entry to nursing as opposed to a BSN. Perhaps you already have another degree.

It's possible to get hired as a bedside nurse with an MSN -- I've precepted nurses with accelerated BSNs, regular BSNs, ADNs and MSN as entry. Generally, the MSNs fare the worst in a new grad orientation scenario and a year out are still lagging behind the BSNs and ADNs. Of course, that could be just because the MSN programs near me are inferior in preparing students to learn to be nurses. Think about what you want to do. Graduate credits are almost always more expensive than undergraduate credits . . . and that may be an important consideration.

You should only consider doing an entry level MSN program if you cannot afford the BSN programs (as in, you need to do a graduate program in order to get enough loans to cover your program), or if you want to be a NP (There are entry level NP programs).

Sure, a MSN looks great to HR but makes you a target on the floors, especially if your manager does not have a MSN :/

Plus, it causes confusion. There are recruiters out there who still do not know about entry level MSN programs; they assume that MSN = 2+ years experience You can end up being blocked from new grad programs because a recruiter thought you were an experienced nurse.