Exaggerations about nursing school

sistasoul · Nov 10, 2007

I never heard any horror stories about nursing school but I can tell some of my own. The first year was really hard. This second and final year does not seem to be as bad for some reason. I think some of the requirements for school are a waste of time. One objective we had to meet was to promote the image of nursing. I had to go out into the community and talk to some teenagers about a career in nursing. I don't mind working hard but I felt the amount of time I put into this project could have been better spent on say, studying for the exams and learning the material for the tests. I think all of these types of projects are what makes school so hard. Promoting nursing you can do once you are a nurse and have more time to do this sort of thing.

SarasotaRN2b · Nov 10, 2007

While nursing school is very stressful and whatnot, I think that people get themselves too worked up. It seems as though everyone in my classes are so worked up about everything that they try to take on too much at once and let themselves down. All you need to do is take thing one step at a time and not freak out about every little thing. Eventually it all comes together and you can't stress yourself out anymore than you already are. I can't help but laugh a little when people are about to cry in the middle of class b/c they are so stressed.

This brings to mind a speech made by a motivational speaker I had watched on TV..."yard by yard, it is hard, but inch by inch, it is a cinch." I'm probably paraphrasing, but this was the jest of it, and it makes real good sense. So many of us get bewildered by the the amount of information, but if you don't break it down to what you need to do now, it can get really overwhelming.

Kris

BlondieRN09 · Nov 10, 2007

I think everyone has hit the nail on the head with what was exaggerated regarding nursing school. I DO still have some free time to do fun things other than study, and I DO get A's without cramming my face in a book for 60 hours per week.

luvs2readlotsRN · Nov 10, 2007

..."first semester is the hardest"...."2nd semester is the hardest",..."3rd semester is the hardest!"....Guess what, they are all a bit hard, BUT DO-ABLE!

SoulShine75 · Nov 11, 2007

Before I started, I thought that a lot was exaggerated...now I know they were telling the truth and I was living in fantasty land before. :lol2:

The only things I have noticed that was exagerated was sometimes talk about how nasty some of the instructors were. I think that is subjective. If someone is failing, then their perspective may be different.

Other than that...it was harder than I had imagined. Dec. 14=pinning! :balloons:

Can't wait to get the heck out!

futurecnm · Nov 11, 2007

"no one gets A's, a B is an A in nursing school" - I have gotten A's in the first 2 semesters

"you will kiss your family and friends good bye" - I spend time with both family and friends. I volunteer at my kid's school, attend all their sporting events, and do things with them whenever they are home. We still do things as a family on my weekends off. I still get together with my friends. I still go away some weekends. In no way have I given up my life. I spend a lot of time on school work but not at the expense of everything else.

"You have to study all the time" - not true. A couple hr a day and more before a test but that is it for me.

"you don't get to sleep" I sleep at least 6 hr every night, even before a test and even the night before clinical. I occasionally stay up until 1am to study but never later.

sistasoul · Nov 11, 2007

"no one gets A's, a B is an A in nursing school" - I have gotten A's in the first 2 semesters
"you will kiss your family and friends good bye" - I spend time with both family and friends. I volunteer at my kid's school, attend all their sporting events, and do things with them whenever they are home. We still do things as a family on my weekends off. I still get together with my friends. I still go away some weekends. In no way have I given up my life. I spend a lot of time on school work but not at the expense of everything else.
"You have to study all the time" - not true. A couple hr a day and more before a test but that is it for me.
"you don't get to sleep" I sleep at least 6 hr every night, even before a test and even the night before clinical. I occasionally stay up until 1am to study but never later.

Please tell me what your secret is. I spend at least 15 hours a week on pre-clinical planning for my patients and on careplans and on all the other miscellaneous paperwork that goes along with our clinical objectives (i.e., complete functional health patterns, process recordings, explaining how we met our clinical objectives, etc). Then we usually have between 100-200 pages a week to read for theory plus various papers to write. This does not include study time for the test. Sometimes I can not get all of the reading done. Please tell me your secret because I obviously am doing something wrong if I am spending at least 30 hrs a week at a minimum on schoolwork. This does not include clinical or theory time or time to actually study for the test. It is like a constant game of catch up where you have to claw your way across the finish line to graduation day. It is crazy stressful but maybe it depends on where you go to school.

God Bless

Alternator81 · Nov 11, 2007

It is not what people made it out to be. At least it's not for out program.

My life is not "over." I still occasionally go out on a weekend, and enjoy time with my friends.

It's not "impossible to get an A." In fact, I would say 1/3 of my class has an A. Unfortunately, it is full of lots of hoops and busy work. We have health promotions, presentations, and papers to do--- oh, and the dreaded groupwork.

It's not "bootcamp". I was always under the impression that CI's are there to breathe down your neck and try to ruin what little life you have left. I could not ask for more wonderful teachers. Actually, it is coming to the end of the semester and I am sad that I will not be with them next semester. I feel like they have taught me so much.

I does greatly depend on the program. People try to make is seem like it's just short of impossible. JUST REMEMBER: There are ALOT of nurses out there, and all of them went to Nursing school and they all graduated. If they can do it, we can too!

Monica D · Nov 11, 2007

I agree with everyone about the "kiss your family goodbye for 2 yrs." thing. I still spend plenty of time with my family and my husband and I have even gone away for the weekend and exams are always on Mondays. Granted, I did study the whole way there and back and a little during the time there. I don't spend time with my friends anymore, though. And I'm sorry, but the time I have will be spent with my family before friends. This has just been my 1st semester, so things may be different next semester...we will see.

I also get A's in my classes. Not as much as I was always used to, but I get them and I'm just glad to be getting through anyway.

I think that it really depends on how many pre-req's one is still doing with their nursing class and how much one has to study.

krenee · Nov 11, 2007

I wonder how much of it depends on what your expectations were? I expected it to be killer but for me, prereqs were harder than NUR 111 by far. I took A&P and microbiology (together) online and I think now that's the hardest thing I'll ever have to do. I studied sometimes 5-6 hours a day, minimum 3-4 . . . but I didn't have to go to class. I don't study as much now and I do get As on the exams.

Our instructors are very nice and definitely want us to succeed. I thought we'd get the warnings about the drop out rate, but we really heard more about how they want us to succeed, and how important it is for us to take care of ourselves, eat right, sleep, exercise, and how you CAN'T study 24 hours a day. They did say we shouldn't work more than 20 hours a week, and it's true that those who do work aren't doing as well. Not saying they aren't passing, just not getting As for the most part.

Anyway, overall I'm enjoying it and it's all do-able. I also agree that it's not so much the material as the amount of material that's tough. Exams covering 7 chapters are scary.

I sleep 7-8 hours per night, btw, and I do have an A average so far! I see my friends ocassionally, and my dh too .

Kelly

MB37 · Nov 11, 2007

My "secret" is to not let the work pile up. I don't think 30 hours a week, outside of class, is unrealistic. Divide it up and that's a little more than 4 hours/day. Some days I spend more than that and others less, but they key is not to have your clinical paperwork to do on top of 100 pages of reading in the next 2 days. I am AHEAD in the reading for one of my classes, and right where I'm supposed to be in another - I'm going out of town next weekend, and I want to have to whole weekend for fun. One thing that makes our lives a little easier - we don't go to the hospital and get patients the night before, so the care plan we turn in each week at pre-conference is on the patient we had the week before. It might be easier to know what to do with the patients if we could look things up in advance, but at least we get to sleep that night.

prinsessa · Nov 12, 2007

My secret to nursing school is to not read everything that is assigned. It is crazy the amount of pages we are supposed to read. We can put all of our books on our computer which makes studying much easier. I just type in a key word and read those paragraphs. I am married and have kids and I think spending time with them is important. This has worked for me because I am pretty sure I am getting As in most (if not all) of my classes. And I also try to just take one week at a time. A lot of my classmates stress about things that are due a month from now. I try to concentrate on things that are due next week....if I didn't I would go crazy. Nursing school is tough but I think that is because we have tons of little things to do all the time. And one thing that is good is that most of the classes have similar content. We read about elimination in one class one week and then in another class the next week.