Higher Calling

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Why is it that nurses are informed from the beginning of their education and throughout their careers that nursing is a higher calling? Is this being taught to management and administrators as well? Rhetorical questions, as a male, in a female-dominated profession, and coming from the corporate world it is rather disingenuous and would never be tolerated in "male" dominated professions. I'm expected to take care of you or your family, and in return I get to work in sub-par environments with sub-par compensation. Why am I nothing more than a liability on the balance sheet?

yes , and he said "hello, this is the hire calling." Har har.

OMG! Very cute!

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ROFL...no kidding!! But whatta I know, I'z graduated from community college...lol....truly funny.

Me too. I'm also female and from the Northeast. 3 strikes.

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Suggesting that one may have a learning disability was not meant to be a negative and I'm unsure why you took such offense to this?

You seriously just asked this question? Publicly? Can't see the problem at all?

You project and deflect with every post and fail to ever address the issue that I put fourth. It's okay if it doesn't excite you or you find no interest in it. I don't appreciate your assumptions and venting due to your lack of understanding or interest.

I don't believe you understand what YOU just wrote, so how can I believe you would understand what *I* wrote? It is you who have filled your posts with nasty accusations and assumptions, THAT would be a good example of deflection right there. You have the audacity to denigrate another person's education because you believe it to be "less" than your own, yet your own posts are resplendent with examples of a poor education.

You are unhappy in your job, your career, I get it. You do NOT, however, have the right to crap all over everyone else and think it's going to go unnoticed, or perhaps even be lauded. Your misery is your own, and you should keep it that way.

NO ONE has agreed with you, perhaps you should recognize that and work toward doing something that does make you happy....because it's evident you do need a change. "The problem" isn't those of us who like what we do....it's people who are unhappy and choose to stay and make everyone ELSE unhappy.

So, as someone else here recently said (GrnTea? Ruby?) "Don't let the door hitcha on the way out".

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yes , and he said "hello, this is the hire calling." Har har.

Ok, you win the internet today!! :D

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Specializes in Med-Surg, Emergency, CEN.

To the original question, I would like to pose this:

Are doctors also discussing whether or not they had a higher calling or are in it for the money? I'm pretty sure they do.

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Specializes in SICU, trauma, neuro.

This. I'll quickly add that I was educated and work in the Midwest, and I too have never been taught anything about nursing being a "calling," let alone a "high calling." I made around $45K last year working half-time, with a 2-year degree. Plus I'm getting financial help from my hospital to complete my BSN. I'm not coming up with another profession where I could be making as much as I am without putting in the hours that they do. I mean I know some skilled tradespeople who make a very good living with minimal education...but they also work a lot more than 20 hours a week!

Putting aside your incredibly rude comments to Brandon for a moment, as he does quite well in speaking for himself....I'll address the rest.

I'm in the Northeast, and nowhere in my nursing education was "a higher calling" part of the expected compensation and reason for being there. My instructors were obviously more progressive than yours in that they focused on Nursing as a profession and the professional conduct and expectations that would go with it. They stressed continuing education, NOT 'higher calling' as important for success within this profession.

It's unfortunate yours didn't, but I think you're going out on a limb suggesting that it's a "Northeast" misconception.

As for the sub-par financial compensation, I'd have to ask you to do your own "apples to apples" comparison, and look to WHAT profession out there allows one to have an Associate's degree and still find decent, career employment? Or, perhaps more accurately, what Associate's degree program could you recommend as one in which the starting pay is more 'par' than what you're seeing in Nursing?

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Specializes in Critical Care.
You are missing the larger point, either intentionally, due to an agenda or you like being argumentative, or possibly due to a reading disability. I never equated a higher calling with being a successful nurse and my point is that nurses are unfairly treated and underpaid. This is justified by employers by manipulation, playing off of women's innate instinct to care and nurture over men's nature. Sorry, if that's stereotypical, but it's true, and yes, there are exceptions.

What about comparing a BSN with other bachelor degrees? An ASN will not even get you an interview at the vast majority of the hospitals in the Philadelphia area and certainly not any of the prestigious hospitals. There are plenty of professions that don't even require a degree that pay better and have much better working conditions, and guess what, they are all male dominated.

I was educated at one of the best nursing schools in the country and don't believe that they are any less progressive than the community college you received your education at.

So what better paying job were you in before you went into nursing? And if it was better paying, why did you become a nurse? I do agree we are underpaid for what we do. But it really depends where you live and who you work for. If you are blessed to be working in a unionized state with good union hospitals then you tend to have great pay or if you work for the VA, most other places not so much. Best bet is to job hop your way to better pay, but it is hard to find good working conditions and hospitals are cutting staffing to save money across the nation.

Good luck to better days!

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This. I'll quickly add that I was educated and work in the Midwest, and I too have never been taught anything about nursing being a "calling," let alone a "high calling." I made around $45K last year working half-time, with a 2-year degree. Plus I'm getting financial help from my hospital to complete my BSN. I'm not coming up with another profession where I could be making as much as I am without putting in the hours that they do. I mean I know some skilled tradespeople who make a very good living with minimal education...but they also work a lot more than 20 hours a week!

BINGO. When people complain about the compensation, I do have to wonder what professions they are comparing to nursing. Comparing apples to apples, there are many who hold Bachelor's degrees in a variety of fields who do not earn what an RN earns.

People may not like what they do, but that doesn't make the compensation for the PROFESSION sub-par. It means that for an individual the compensation isn't ENOUGH....for them. To do what they are required to do in the job that they have been hired to do. Really not the same as being "sub-par" when it comes to overall compensation for the profession. No one can ever be paid what they are "worth" when it comes to emotional values, that isn't compensable. We ALWAYS feel we should be paid more simply because we feel we've put so much work into our jobs, why doesn't it pay us more for our effort.....but in reality, EFFORT isn't what earns one a paycheck, it's the PRODUCT. If you did your job, you get paid what the job pays, not how much emotion you invested. Just how it is.

I remember some years ago, a medical resident shared with me how much he earned. He was making a fraction more than I was; when you compared how many HOURS he put in for that job, he was making WAY less than I was. Now, if I were to just look at the fact that he had a four-year undergraduate degree AND a four-year medical degree, I could simply state that he was earning too little for that much education. He certainly wouldn't be drawing that conclusion, though, because once he completed his education/training/residency, he would be making BUCKETFULS more money than I ever would. THAT's the Big Picture.

Maybe that's what those who believe nursing's pay is sub-par really is: they don't see the big picture?

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Specializes in OB.

Bottom line: Most of us disagree with you, and if you dislike nursing so much, you're free to leave the profession at any time. I personally have been extremely content with my career choice and the opportunities it opened up to me, and was never fed any lines about nursing being a "calling."

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To the original question, I would like to pose this:

Are doctors also discussing whether or not they had a higher calling or are in it for the money? I'm pretty sure they do.

This is a forum for nurses, nursing students, etc., and the title of the webpage is allnurses.com. Personally, I can't speak for doctors, and apparently I can't have an opinion about nursing. Again, baffling that I'm personally attacked for advocating for better conditions for nurses.

Within 3 years I will be in independent practice and only loosely associated with the field. I won't be providing patient care or working with other nurses. I don't really have a dog in the fight at that point, but I'm genuinely surprised at the denial and resistance to the idea that nursing is flawed and needs to change. It needs to change not only for nurses, but our patients, resident, clients, or clever name here. I haven't posted much here and don't mind honest debate, but I get personally attacked and accused of being something I'm not.

Nursing was built on the idea that it is a higher calling and to the people saying I've never heard that, too bad. From those beginnings and that fact that it's a female dominated profession, for better or worse, this is the end results. Apparently I'm in the minority in thinking that nursing can be improved upon and glad I'm only passing through.

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One cannot lash out and attack others, then claim ignorance of same while declaring that he, himself, has been attacked.

Sorry, doesn't wash.

You didn't come here simply espousing the need for change in the field, YOU went on the OFFENSIVE immediately. You slammed people's philosophies of nursing. You slammed their education. You slammed them for simply disagreeing with you and your rambling, angry posts.

Many people come here to talk about discontent within the profession and their threads, their comments, are WELCOMED. Because you have now managed to write one civil, non-accusatory (backpeddling) post does not erase your history here.

Play nicely and people will play with you. Run up and smack someone, then run away, and say you don't know why you are being dragged off the playground? Predictable.

And like I said before.....if you're only passing through....buh-bye!

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I was never "called" to nursing. I could easily leave to do another job that paid just as well.

I love to work with people. Before I became a nurse I worked as a hairdresser. When the economy tanked, so did business at the salon. I wanted a job where I could predict my paycheck. And here I am. Take it or leave it. It's a job and not in the top 5 things that are most important to me.

I sometimes think my detached feeling from it allows me to see emergencies through pretty neutral eyes, but I know plenty of more passionate nurses who do well under pressure as well.

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