Getting into nursing school.

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I need to precede what I am going to write by stating that I do not believe in affirmative action. I believe that any needless details like skin color, age, gender, sexual orientation (blah blah blah) should be meaningless when it comes to who is best qualified.

That being said I am a 44 year old male who just got into nursing school and will start in the fall. I did all my pre-reqs and got all As and 1 B+. My TEAS was not as good as I wanted it to be (75), but it is what it is.

While my opinion on affirmative action is strongly held, I am also 44 years old and not stupid enough to ask "Did my age or gender have anything to do with me getting in; or did I earn this on my own". That would label me a possible problem and I may not get in because I asked the question.

However, when I was notified that I got in, it was stated that I had to a certain date to accept. My guess is that they do it that way because students may get accepted to multiple programs. Had I not wanted to go to my current school, they would have given my spot to someone else who presumably did not do as well as me.

Is it safe to assume that my gender/age were not deciding factors in me getting in since I was not on the 'call back' list?

Before anyone bites my head off as far as "Schools don't do that", I was told by 2 different counselors that my school does. I think when they told me that it was meant to encourage me; but I do have morals and did not take what they said as encouragement. I am very happy I got in, but it has to be because I worked hard and not because of my genitalia or how long I have been on the planet.

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Specializes in progressive care. med surg. tele. LTC. psych..

Lol, why does it even matter that much? You got in! :)

If you were to find out that the odds were in your favor due to your gender, would you withdrawal?

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Specializes in ICU.

You had the grades and a good TEAS score. A 75 is a very good score for TEAS. I'm not sure why you think affirmative action had anything to do with it. Doesn't affirmative action usually put white males at a disadvantage? I'm struggling as to why you think that's why you got in.

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Ditto. Why does it matter? Would you turn down your acceptance if you found out you may have been favored because you were male?

So what if the school may be trying to increase the # of male nursing students? From your grades, it looked liked you earned your spot anyway.

I applied to nursing school with a 3.9 GPA and scored in the 99th percentile on my entrance exam. If I was given any sort of advantage for being 30, having 2 kids, being poor, and a minority, guess what? I wouldn't have cared, because I earned my spot regardless.

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Specializes in Hospice, Palliative Care.

Good day:

Is it safe to assume that my gender/age were not deciding factors in me getting in since I was not on the 'call back' list?

No, it is not safe to assume (rarely is it safe to assume). In 2013, I applied to a well known, profit-based, RN school at the age of 50. Even though I had graduated from business school with a 3.98 GPA, and was successful in the IT/business world for several decades, I didn't get into the school. The letter I received denying my acceptance was the best written letter one could write that dealt with age discrimination (my age) without being blatant about it. After talking with someone in their 40's who did get into the program, they shared they had to fight their way in making threats of legal action because they were given a similar story. Personally, I'm not the least bit litigious, so I didn't go that route.

Instead, I started going to a local community college where I worked on my prerequisites full time, all year round, and applied to their RN program. I was accepted, and I'm now in my 3rd semester. Jesus willing, I will graduate this coming December at the age of 53, and pass my boards early in 2017.

Don't give up the dream. Continue the journey.

Thank you.

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Specializes in ICU.
Good day:

No, it is not safe to assume (rarely is it safe to assume). In 2013, I applied to a well known, profit-based, RN school at the age of 50. Even though I had graduated from business school with a 3.98 GPA, and was successful in the IT/business world for several decades, I didn't get into the school. The letter I received denying my acceptance was the best written letter one could write that dealt with age discrimination (my age) without being blatant about it. After talking with someone in their 40's who did get into the program, they shared they had to fight their way in making threats of legal action because they were given a similar story. Personally, I'm not the least bit litigious, so I didn't go that route.

Instead, I started going to a local community college where I worked on my prerequisites full time, all year round, and applied to their RN program. I was accepted, and I'm now in my 3rd semester. Jesus willing, I will graduate this coming December at the age of 53, and pass my boards early in 2017.

Don't give up the dream. Continue the journey.

Thank you.

I think you are awesome and always have!! I can't wait to see you become a nurse.

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Specializes in Critical Care, Education.

Hmm - I firmly believe that there is currently an undercurrent of age-ism in nursing school acceptance rates, so if OP's gender served to balance that out.... Good for him!!!

In my part of the country, male students are pretty commonplace so schools aren't going out of their way to increase their numbers. My own organization's percentage of male nurses far exceeds the national average - but I think that's because we're fortunate to have facilities in many ares with high military presence and benefit from that population of medics who become nurses.

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I don't want to be a hypocrite is why. My GPA is good and my TEAS was not horrible, but I do believe in earning things. I learned today that a girl I teamed up with to do some projects (21 year old white girl) got in and her grades were not as good as mine (2 Bs and an A in A&P1/2 and Micro) and her TEAS test was about the same as mine.

I agree with you on the not caring if I was given 'special consideration' if it was not the deciding factor. Your grades rocked, and if you were given any special consideration it was not needed. I disagree with you that there is something good about wanting to increase the number of "X" type of nurses. I don't think it is appropriate to give any consideration to anyone based off of anything other than their results; esp. when with the job we are all trying to get, that by not knowing your job can get someone killed.

Anyhow, I am confident now that me getting in was decided by my own efforts and not some silly quota. I will say one thing about the age part of it that got me thinking. The first week of A&P1 I had over heard a conversation from 2 girls (early 20s) where one girl said she wanted to buy a 20k car, but didn't know if she could afford it because she made 9 bucks an hour at Walmart and only worked 10 hours a week. The second girl encouraged her to go and buy the car (which I assume her parents were going to co-sign for). Wisdom doesn't always follow age, but a lot of times it does. Needless to say neither of these girls survived A&P1.

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Specializes in CTICU/ER/Dialysis.

I don't think you should even concern yourself with such things. The counselors most likely don't even know what sort of criteria the nursing school uses to select their students aside from the gpa and test scores. We can all make assumptions but unless we are behind the scenes we will never know. In any case, congrats on the acceptance, I'm sure you've worked hard to get to this point.

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It is the schools problem not yours. You don't have to jeapordize your dreams, careers, and education because of their decision.

Depending on the program you may or may not have been accepted because of being male etc...

however, a nearly perfect gpa says a lot about a candidate for nursing school

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Specializes in NICU.

I have a hard time believing that schools are still giving special treatment for males. Like a previous poster stated that there are many male 2nd degree career changers and military medics that are entering nursing school. 10/29 (33%) of my ABSN cohort was male. That far exceeds the 12% male nursing student average. It is not in the school's best interest to allow a male that had lower GPA/TEAS score over a female applicant with better grades and score when the school is highly focused on their NCLEX pass rate. Would they allow 10 males that are C students into their program in the hope that they would be able to graduate and pass NCLEX just to increase their "male" percentage?

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Specializes in Psych/Mental Health.

Your grades and scores are competitive and I wouldn't worry about you getting unfair preferential treatment.

GPA and TEAS aren't the be-all end-all. Having high GPA/TEAS is nice but doesn't make that person more qualified than other students with lower GPA/TEAS; this is the same with nursing school. There's a lot more than those numbers that go into being good at a job. Having a diverse workforce does benefit society because our society itself is diverse.

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