Getting discouraged with internships

[kgh31386, BSN, MSN, RN]

I've made another thread about an internship. The first one was not being able to find one, this one is about how it's becoming discouraging that the hospitals in this city seem to be hiring people from their own school or from within families. This may not be true in all cases, but it's how it seems in quite a few. It's taken me a year just to get an interview, and that interview consisted of being taken on a tour, and being asked NO questions. I asked questions yes and was professional as well. It was a Baptist hospital, the nurse manager said she went to the Baptist nursing school here in town, and said she couldn't have survived if she went to the school I go to. She said she was interviewing 10 people, and I'm wondering how can she pick 1 person out of 10 if she doesn't ask anyone any questions or anything? This was the week before Christmas and she said it'd be after January 1st before they chose; she told me to call and ask her...so I have, and each time they say she isn't there. I've left messages and nothing. The girl I'm dating has been applying at the same hospitals had not had an interview after a year either...UNTIL. She told her roommate last week she hadn't gotten an interview, and her roommate's dad is a "high up" person for Baptist in the city, some kind of vice president. Less than a week after telling her roommate, the recruiter called and asked where she wants her application sent, 2 days later she gets called for an interview. Now she has an interview tomorrow at the hospital that she wants to be at....all because her roommate called her Dad. When she told her roommate she hadn't had an interview after a year, her roommate said," Oh well we're gonna change that, you're getting a job, lemme call my Dad". It's just discouraging that I bust my butt in school and clinicals to get letters of recommendation, for nothing. I know my stuff, I even talk to my friend who's a nurse about mostly nursing stuff, I love learning new things..but it's getting me nowhere at the moment. I spent a good while in the summer going to different clinics and hospitals just to be told the same thing,"We don't know who to talk to about that, or we aren't hiring sorry". Another example, this girl who knows absolutely nothing and passed EVERY class by 1 point got a job at a hospital because her dad's a doctor there. She even brags that she doesn't have to do anything because her dad's there, she wants to marry a doctor she said. Another girl got a job because her neighbor worked in the hospital...I just don't know what else I'm supposed to do, I'm just a guy who wants an internship....is that so much to ask?

[misswhitney]

Bug, bug, bug HR! My friend told me for her to get a job, she had to go to the hospital she wanted to work for, filled out an application there, online, and handed them her resume and faxed it to them as well. She then had her references call and then after a week she called and asked to speak to whoever was in charge of hiring GN's and new RN's and asked if her app. had been pulled. She had family at another hospital, but not the one she wanted to work at. Another thing is to make sure they know how much you want to work at their hospital. Give reasons. Good luck!

[kgh31386, BSN, MSN, RN]

At another hospital when I talked to them, I called twice a week for 6 months. At the 6 month mark I was told my application had been lost, I had been down there twice, she told me she would get me in for orientation the next week, I called the next week, the lady suddenly disappeared...for such a shortage, it seems pretty hard to get hired.

[misserella8036]

Same kinda thing happened to someone I know - they got a highly competitive externship because they had a family member in "high places." It really sucks that it's usually "who" you know and not "what" you know.