Finally, I've reached the 'acceptance' stage

[I♥Dexter]

Well, I've finally reached the final stage of the stages-of-grief, pertaining to RN employment, post-nursing school. I graduated with my ADN in December 2010 and have absolutely no employment prospects. I started net-working and applying for new grad programs in September. I have letters-of-recommendation from my clinical instructors as well as from my current employer (waitress) and I graduated with honors, and still, nobody is interested in even giving me an interview. Since I received my license (Jan 2011), I have been volunteering at a Free clinic and applying for jobs daily, but to no avail.

Thanks to facebook, I am able to keep up with everyone from school and am aware of how others are fairing in the job market. There is one large area hospital that everyone from my school does clinicals at and so it is almost expected that the new grads who did well will be hired quickly... but that hasn't been the case. I am still receiving emails from the recruiter, stating that she hopes to have interviews soon, etc... Meanwhile, on FB I see that there are people who graduated a quarter after me, that are already being hired on there. Even a girl from my class, who I tutored all through nsg school, who also failed NCLEX the first time, has recently been hired.

Oh yeah, and one bit I forgot to mention... I am 36 and all of the people from my school who have been hired since graduation are much younger, between the ages of 21 and 25. A few of them are in their late 20's early 30's but they all already worked for the said hospital. Anyways, I am not writing all of this, looking for a pitty party, I just really needed to vent. I will admit, that I have not applied to any LTC facilities, just strictly hospitals. The reason being that I went to nursing school with hopes of becoming a RNFA and then eventually a CRNA and both specialties require acute care and/or OR experience neither of which are attainable in LTC. And around here, you are truly only considered a new grad, i.e, eligible for residencies within the first 6 months post grad... So, I'm running out of time. I've been accepted into the RN-to-BSN program, that starts in the Fall, and I'm debating whether or not I should fork over more money for more school, when I'm still paying for the first round of schooling...

Thanks for listening.

[ZooMommyRN, ADN, RN]

I'd continue with the BSN program, in many areas a new BSN will get hired before a new ADN Good luck!

[SummerGarden, BSN, MSN, RN]

good vent.... i understand that the market is tough so i thought your title was referring to being accepted to work or being accepted by co-workers.

in any case, is it possible that the others got hired because of whom he/she knows? i noticed that young people in his/her 20s tend to think negatively of this route and so will shy away from admitting that this was the case even to friends and peers. if your peers are getting jobs because of who he/she knows then let him/her know that you have no problem with this (i.e. you know that the world works this way) and to drop your name to hiring managers as well. i helped a friend get a job she really wanted because of the connections i had made at the time. she was qualified and i knew of her work ethic so i was not concerned that she would make me look bad in the future.

btw, say nothing crazy about yourself or being a new grad on fb. being 36 you probably already know how to behave in public, but i just wanted to add this as a reminder. gl!