I am not sure if it is true or not, but I heard that RNs get a little extra pay when they work on a day where nursing students are present. If the charge RN assigned a student to an RN, then they get the extra pay.
I am talking about college nursing students not training a new employee.
It just came on top of my head because I have been assigned to lousy RNs during my clinical rotations and it feels like they should be more engaged with students
Were you too not a nursing student once? Who taught you? Yes you are busy we as students get that. I'm so tired of hearing about how terrible it is to have to have us nursing students on your shift! We are there to learn and we are eager to learn just like you were when you were a student! Every day nurses are complaining about being short handed. Quit acting like having an extra person there to teach is such a big deal. It does not take that much effort to explain what your doing whe your doing it!
we complain about being short handed because we probably are. as a student you don't get the entire picture of the responsibilities you hold as a nurse, even with clinical rotations. its more than just explaining what were doing when doing it to students, its a matter of having them understand why were doing it that way vs another, explaining our thought process can be tedious when in our minds were also tracking the next prn doses, when the zosyn will finish so we can hang the vanco, what time x patient is going down for surgery and what time the preop meds have to be given. nurses "complain" as you put it, because its not easy.. we have to be more aware of every teachable moment aka the entire shift to try and teach you everything we know.
by the way it was my clinical instructor who taught me about 80% of the time. yes i had a pt that was assigned to my nurse, and i consulted that nurse every time i were to give a med or whatever, but my ci was always there when i was charting or doing direct pt care. the nurse is an extension of your learning experience, not the main source. hands on exp, wisdom and doses of reality are what we can pretty much provide, not an entire 8 hour lesson
Were you too not a nursing student once? Who taught you? Yes you are busy we as students get that. I'm so tired of hearing about how terrible it is to have to have us nursing students on your shift! We are there to learn and we are eager to learn just like you were when you were a student! Every day nurses are complaining about being short handed. Quit acting like having an extra person there to teach is such a big deal. It does not take that much effort to explain what your doing whe your doing it!
My instructors taught me. You know, the ones who were actually getting paid to do so.
The floor nurses, back in the day, did not teach us, our instructors did. We had our own assignment of up to 4 patients and we did everything for those patients. By everything, I mean all cares, beds, wounds, IVs, meds assessments. The nurses would find us and ask if we needed a certain skill and we would call our instructor to come if she wasn't on the floor. The RNs didn't even co-sign our notes or anything, we were responsible and our instructor looked over everything. We were never standing around or following an RN around.
Were you too not a nursing student once? Who taught you? Yes you are busy we as students get that. I'm so tired of hearing about how terrible it is to have to have us nursing students on your shift! We are there to learn and we are eager to learn just like you were when you were a student! Every day nurses are complaining about being short handed. Quit acting like having an extra person there to teach is such a big deal. It does not take that much effort to explain what your doing whe your doing it!
The problem is that you're thinking you've been assigned to a nurse.
No. You've been assigned to a patient. The nurse just happens to be sucked into the vortex of your entitlement and your CI's incompetence.
Of course we remember what it was like to be a student. Even those of us who were students 40 years ago.
The thing is, back then, a student would be taught by her CI. If there was something to be done that the student needed to observe or return demo, the nurse would have been asked (politely) by the CI if she would mind having the student present.
We were informed by our CI that we were guests of the hospital, and if they heard any complaints about our behavior, we would be thinking of something else to major in. No hogging the chairs at the nurse's station, no congregating as a group, no getting in the staff's way. Period.
I don't even really remember a lot of interaction with my patient's nurse, except to give her report at the end of the day, and occasionally during the shift if something happened.
The clinical group was smaller back then-usually no more than 5 students per CI. Her presence was definitely large; if she stayed any closer to us, she would have been stuck to our backs. Nowadays, the CI can be pretty much invisible.
And, to answer the original question, no, the floor nurse does NOT get paid to teach you. If she did, it should come out of your CI's salary. Because that's HER job.
Nope, not paid....though I had two students with me yesterday in my 3 patient stepdown assignment. As others have stated, it actually made my day a little more challenging rather than easier, but I remember being a student and having a few nurses who took the opportunity to show me a little more, teach me a little more, and I'm grateful for that and would like to pass that on. Ultimately it does fall to their instructor to educate, but I really enjoy explaining why I'm doing what I'm doing to them while they're there. I have a passion for education. But I can totally understand why some may say it's more challenging. I had to still assess all three patients, complete patient education and care plans, give all meds, and then doublecheck the emr assessments the students did to make sure that they were complete and accurate, not to mention patient care, which naturally goes slower with week 2 students. It's legitimately twice the work. I do also, however, remember how slow I was as a student, and I remember a nurse who was annoyed and frustrated with me as well as a few who encouraged and helped me...as they're only there one day a week, I hope I'm the latter.
And not every nurse wants to teach, so I do understand the frustration when paired with a student. One of my very favorite and most knowledgable colleagues, my solid go-to when I need a second opinion or advice, told me in advance when I started that I needed to ask frequent questions as teaching wasn't second nature to her. She's a goldmine of information, but we're just wired differently. Nothing wrong with that.
Were you too not a nursing student once? Who taught you? Yes you are busy we as students get that. I'm so tired of hearing about how terrible it is to have to have us nursing students on your shift! We are there to learn and we are eager to learn just like you were when you were a student! Every day nurses are complaining about being short handed. Quit acting like having an extra person there to teach is such a big deal. It does not take that much effort to explain what your doing whe your doing it!
A) My school faculty (clinical instructors) taught me.
B) Yes, we all remember what it was like to be a student. Students, on the other hand, have no idea what it's like to be a practicing RN.
C) Come back here when you've been an RN for a few years, working on a busy floor, and tell us how you feel about getting students dumped on you out of the blue by clinical instructors who can't be bothered to do their jobs (that they are getting paid to do, not us).
Were you too not a nursing student once? Who taught you? Yes you are busy we as students get that. I'm so tired of hearing about how terrible it is to have to have us nursing students on your shift! We are there to learn and we are eager to learn just like you were when you were a student! Every day nurses are complaining about being short handed. Quit acting like having an extra person there to teach is such a big deal. It does not take that much effort to explain what your doing whe your doing it!
It takes a huge effort to explain what I'm doing when I'm doing it. Having a student around adds HOURS of explanation if the student is not familiar with the process/equipment.
Let's take a very much every day thing for my unit like responding to a ventilator alarm. Let's also say this is the nursing student's first time encountering a ventilator.
Do you know what the causes of the low pressure alarm are?
Do you know what the causes of a high pressure alarm are?
How do you troubleshoot those?
What is the waveform supposed to look like when it's a machine-triggered breath vs. a patient-triggered breath? Which is the patient doing right now?
What is breath stacking? How do you fix it?
What is a normal tidal volume? A normal minute ventilation? If the vent is not set for normal values - why are the values different for this patient?
What is the mode the patient's on, anyway? What's the difference between CPAP, PRVC, and APRV?
If you can't answer all of those questions, explaining to you why I'm suctioning a patient vs. pushing extra sedation vs. calling RT and asking if they want to come look at the vent settings and make adjustments when an alarm sounds is going to take half an hour. In real life, I look at the alarm, I look at the patient, and I do whatever needs to be done. A student increases the amount of work I have to do for even a basic task thirty fold, easily.
nursephillyphil, BSN, RN
325 Posts
we complain about being short handed because we probably are. as a student you don't get the entire picture of the responsibilities you hold as a nurse, even with clinical rotations. its more than just explaining what were doing when doing it to students, its a matter of having them understand why were doing it that way vs another, explaining our thought process can be tedious when in our minds were also tracking the next prn doses, when the zosyn will finish so we can hang the vanco, what time x patient is going down for surgery and what time the preop meds have to be given. nurses "complain" as you put it, because its not easy.. we have to be more aware of every teachable moment aka the entire shift to try and teach you everything we know.