Correctional nursing - first job or acute care first?

[taylor.sponsler]

I am 2 semesters away from graduating with my BSN (December '15). Currently, I am very interested in correctional nursing. I live in the Williamsport area of PA - near Muncy SCI, Allenwood FCC and USP Lewisburg - all correctional institutes within 1/2 hour of my home, so all would be potential career opportunities. But, I have heard that prisons will pay more if you have a year of acute care experience; although, they will hire new grads.

What is the best course of action? Has anyone done correctional nursing right out of school and gotten paid well? Would anyone be willing to share starting salary information for their correctional experience or any of these institutions or any other? Would they actually pay more with experience (I've heard $20,000/year more?) or is it best to just jump right into it if I plan on making a career out of it?

[amoLucia]

You may not have any luxury in picking and choosing selectively your first position.

[LilRedRN1973]

I am a nursing supervisor in the prison infirmary in my state. The RN I supervise is a new grad (well, she just celebrated her first year but she was here upon graduating school as was another RN on days). I will say that working in the infirmary, it's important to have good assessment skills and be able to make timely decisions as you are granted quite a bit of autonomy. The way it works with our facilities within the state system is that a new grad is considered an RN I in the prison. I believe the pay is $67,692.96 There are steps within the state system and in the prison, you start out at the top of the step scale. After one year, you then become a Correctional Nurse I, which pays $74,082.24. One year later, you are autopromoted to Correctional Nurse II, which pays $81,139.68. The retirement is very good within the state system and our benefits, while not the best, are still just as good as I was offered within the hospital setting. I started out as a Psychiatric RN I with the state then autopromoted to a PN II after a year. Spent 4 years working in outpatient clinic, making about $62k a year. When this position opened up and I saw that I qualified, I put in for a transfer and was offered the position. My pay is just under $90k a year and to be honest, working in the prison is a wonderfully kept secret. I enjoy my job just as much as I did in the ICU or the outpatient clinic but I am making a lot more money and don't go home all beat up like I did when in the ICU. Having to deal with prison politics is the reason for the high pay :-)