When did it start getting so difficult to get into Nursing School?

Nurses General Nursing

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Does anyone know exactly when it started getting so difficult and so darn competitive to get into nursing school? I remember back in 1976 when I was teaching high school biology that I considered going to back to a community college for a RN degree and the high school guidance counselor where I was teaching told me not even to try that I'd never get in. Me, with a BS degree at the time was told to forget it!

So..who knows when it all started.....the competition for the RN program?:nurse:

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Well I'm in nursing school now and over half of my class joined because the economy tanked and they wanted a "secure job"

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Specializes in OB-Gyn/Primary Care/Ambulatory Leadership.

I think it started getting harder in the last 2-3 years, when supply (of nurses) started to exceed demand.

When I entered nursing school, I got in the first semester I applied (I aced the NET, which I'm sure helped). Now the same school seems to have a waiting list of at least a year.

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I don't think you read my whole post. In 1976 I was told that community college nursing school programs were highly competitive and I was told that even with a BS in science I probably wouldn't have gotten in.

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Does anyone know exactly when it started getting so difficult and so darn competitive to get into nursing school? I remember back in 1976 when I was teaching high school biology that I considered going to back to a community college for a RN degree and the high school guidance counselor where I was teaching told me not even to try that I'd never get in. Me, with a BS degree at the time was told to forget it!

So..who knows when it all started.....the competition for the RN program?:nurse:

I think that guidance counselor fed you a line of bull; if you met the course prereqs and minimum GPA, you were eligible for admission to the nursing programs at the community colleges. The popularity of the nursing programs is cyclical; right now, with the recession and the belief that there is a "nursing shortage" and jobs galore, everyone and their grandmother is trying to go into nursing which accounts for the multiple year waiting lists.

Just 6 yrs ago, when I started nursing school, there was no waiting list, in fact, our class was not even full.

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I think becoming a nurse is not an easy task, a nurse saves lives and plays an important role in society. I guess it is highly competitive because they want to accept the best or the ones that can make it as nurses. If it were so easy to get into nursing school, the world would be flooded with nurses. Just my opinion. :)

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When was it that diploma programs started to disappear in favor of ADN and BSN programs? I am wondering if maybe the requirements for nursing instructors got harder. As it is, one reason it is difficult to get into a program is the shortage of instructors, so if my hunch is correct, you could follow the timeline back to when diploma programs started to fade out.

Oh, and a lot of it depends on where you live. A friend of mine in FL was just recently waitlisted...she too, had a 4 yr. degree and high GPA.

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I don't think you read my whole post. In 1976 I was told that community college nursing school programs were highly competitive and I was told that even with a BS in science I probably wouldn't have gotten in.

It was competitive in 74 at the community college that I went to...counselor tried to talk me out of applying. there were over 600 applicants for 30 slots...I got in

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Specializes in ICU.

I'm sure a lot of this depends on your location. I haven't found it difficult at all to get into nursing school. But I also worked very hard on my pre-reqs (and previous BA degree) to earn an awesome GPA. I've gotten accepted into every program I've applied to, but decided to decline all offers and hold off until next year for the ABSN program that I missed the deadline for this year. In my area of the country, there's not a lot of waitlisting going on, especially for people with good transcripts.

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Specializes in Critical Care, Patient Safety.
I think becoming a nurse is not an easy task, a nurse saves lives and plays an important role in society. I guess it is highly competitive because they want to accept the best or the ones that can make it as nurses. If it were so easy to get into nursing school, the world would be flooded with nurses. Just my opinion. :)

Um, the world is kind of flooded with nurses right now (as evidenced by the high number of unemployed nurses). I don't think that's really any indication of how difficult (or not) it is to get into nursing school. I live in a major metropolitan area, and it's been extremely competitive to get into a nursing program around here for the past several years. It's entirely cyclical, compounded with the problem that we don't have enough people qualified to teach. Compounded with the fact that nursing programs have not historically been profitable for colleges and universities (unlike medical school programs).

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Am going to go out on a limb and say things began to tighten up in terms of getting into NPs or schools, within roughly the past five to ten years. Much depends upon what type of program and or location.

Some of this is most probably related to the last time the NCLEX rasied it's "passing" score, thus raising the bar for nursing programs if they wanted to keep high passing rates. Other input has come from the ANA and other professional bodies pushing for changes in how nurses are educated to take into account changes in the profession. For instance the push to require *all* nursing students to take chemistry (general and perhaps organic), came from the ANA (IIRC). Many programs have replaced bacteriology with microbiology as well.

Then there is the fact that many ADN and diploma programs are struggling to add the extra course content that BSN programs already have, again to adjust to changing of the profession.

When you start adding courses that are more "difficult" and more demanding, in order to keep a high NCLEX passing and indeed graduation rate, it is often required to screen more carefully to weed out those whom statistically aren't likely to do well.

There are tons of studies and research done by schools and nursing professional bodies on which students are likely to pass the boards on their first attempt, and sadly that is something all nursing programs are concerned with.

Finally after a period of time when nursing schools were closing due to lack of interest in the profession, the "nursing shortage" and promise of a "good well paying career for life" have lured persons out of the wood work. Nursing programs simply cannot handle every applicant that comes their way due to the natural class size cut offs. So schools are turning to the pre-nursing NLN and other exams or SAT scores to further help them decide who are the best chances of graduating and passing the boards.

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Forgot to add that within the past several years hospitals (still the largest employer of nurses), have given vast amount of feedback to nursing programs in terms of what they want to see in RNs.

Be it hiring only BSN nurses, or insisting on certain skills, programs have no choice but to comply and thus have to prepare their students as best they can. This often means a grueling nursing program that (again) studies show only highly motivated and academically bright are able to complete.

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