How much chaos is acceptable?

[smarti15]

I am a second year nursing student. I am fully aware of the chaos that accompanies nursing school. I am normally very conducive to chaos, and have done well in this particular nursing program. This year, however, has been an unusual amount of chaos. We have a few new nursing instructors (some great, some not so great). Not only have we had a change in instructors, but several of our textbooks have changed from the previous third semester books. This has created a problem with our exams. We have been told (and hounded, and ridiculed) about cheating, and the fact that we should not share study guides. Now these instructors that have been hounding us are giving us the exams from the previous third semester, some of this stuff is out of entirely new textbooks. We have a couple of awesome instructors, and their efforts are evidenced by our exam scores. These instructors work hard to give us the information we need not only to pass exams, but to be great nurses. Most of the students in our class are passing these particular exams with relative ease (is there really ease in nursing exams?). However, we have a couple of instructors that do not put very much effort into teaching us. They are using old material from the previous third semester, they just stand at the podium and talk, and they tell us irrelevant stories. The effort of these instructors can be seen by exam scores as well. In our pharmacology class, not one person in our class passed the exam (there are 26 of us). Many of us spend every night studying in a study group, and we are obviously not idiots, we made it through LPN school with no problems. The other class that we are having difficulty with, only 5 people passed. Is this common? Does anyone have any recommendations about how to handle this? We have discussed this with the dean of nursing, and she just tells us to study harder. If you have any advice I would more than happy to hear it.

[blessed80]

I experienced the same thing while in nursing school.I recently graduated in july 2009. I found it better just keeping to myself. I would socialize with instructors and fellow classmates on an as needed basis. Nursing school is suppose to be a peacful learning experience. The chaos shouldn't come until you are in the working field. As we all know that doesn't happen. Speaking from experience on 10% of the textbook information is helpful. Nursing is a changing field on a daily basis. I would suggest: (1) studying alone (2) don't gossip with classmates/instructors (3) don't give in to the devil and give up (4) PRAY, PRAY, and PRAY again.