How can I get experience now?!?!...it's a question not rant...

[oguesswhat]

Ok my question is...how can I get experience now that I have graduated from nursing school. Most hospitals want 1 year experience as a nurse...or experience as an extern, aid, tech...whatever. I was a medical assistant at a doctors office for 6 months before I started nursing school but it was full time and didn't work with my school schedule so I worked part time as a waitress instead during school. During nursing school I tried to get a job as an extern but since I was admitted in the winter I was not eligible for an extern position until the fall...however most are available in the summer. During the winter one hospital did have externs. Out of almost 50 applicants they were only able to take 7. Unfortunately I wasn't one of them.

Now what I want to know is there anything I can do to get experience now that I graduated (2 and 1/2 months ago) and passed the NCLEX-RN (2 weeks ago) until someone hires me? I know that I will need to stay current on my CPR but I have until November for that. I really want a job. And want to find a way to get one. Besides calling and emailing people most days and applying every day I am not sure what else to do!

[oguesswhat]

Any one?

[Txangel791]

You can try a small hospital in a smaller town. The big cities have way more applicants and pay more. Find a small suburb or rural area and take the lower pay- count the experience as one of the benefits.

[oguesswhat]

I have applied to every hospital that I can think of within an hour distance from my house.

[chevyv, BSN, RN]

There really isn't an answer. It's hard to get a job right now. You may have to take one in ltc or ? and keep applying until you get lucky. Employers are being picky right now. It sucks. I work as a lpn, but graduated from the rn program in May. I'm taking my time studying for my boards because there aren't any jobs right now. I thought if anything I would volunteer at a hospital and maybe build that into my resume and land a spot that way. Good luck!

[jjjoy, LPN]

It's a frustrating situation that I can relate to as when I graduated in the mid-90's my class faced similar difficulties, with few of us landing jobs immediately out of school. Hospitals had started a round of down-sizing and were laying off nurses left and right. We new grads were competing with a flood of experienced RNs for a smaller number of nursing jobs. I moved out of the area so I'm not sure how long it took to turn around; but when I returned to the area five years later, hospitals were back to actively recruiting nursing students, signing them on before graduation, and offering sign-on bonuses.

I know it's a frustrating place to be in. Knowing that the job market might be better in a year or two doesn't help you land a job NOW. And it doesn't help the negative impact of applying for a "new grad" job if you graduated over 6 months ago but haven't been able to land a job. But it's the unfortunate reality of *today* that the job market is very tight for new grads in some areas. That's what you've got to work with. It can help to be very assertive and persistent in applying to every possible job and talking directly to nurse managers and following up regularly with places you'd like to work. No guarantee that all that work will definitely land you a job, but it DOES increase your odds. Also, I'd suggest to ask and ask and ask for opportunities to shadow (several will say no, so that's why ask and ask and ask) and use this unwanted jobless downtime to find out more about the various nursing jobs and health care facilities out there.