I need some help..

[jeffroudbai]

Hey, my name is Jeff and I am in need of desperate help. I'm 19 years old and attending my second year of community college. I am trying to earn my bachelors degree as a nurse, but my GPA is horrible. I am at a 2.2 right now and would love to transfer out to receive my bachelor degree. I am a volunteer firefighter, a head lifeguard (supervisor of lifeguards), I manage my fathers restaurant, and I am a children's ski/snowboard instructor at a ski mountain in the Poconos. I volunteer with a mildly autistic 14 year old once a week as well. I began a volunteer job at Winthrop-NYU Hospital in the Pediatrics Emergency Department. I am close with the head of anesthesiologist at Jacobi Medical Center in the Bronx so he will be writing one of my recommendation letters. I took the TEAS and scored a 70% overall, the average was a 65%. I have over 15 nursing schools I am willing to apply to. I am just afraid because the GPA minimum on most are 2.75-3.2. Please let me know what I should do.

Jeff

[Wiggly Litchi]

The best thing you can do is talk to advisers at the school(s) you want to attend. Nursing schools can be extremely competitive, so one of your first concerns will be raising your GPA. Some schools won't allow retakes of old classes so this is why you want to get with the advisers as they'll be able to tell you what the best steps to take would be.

Another thing is that you've got to figure out why your GPA is so low - There's many reasons why this could be the case. Some students may have a difficult time understanding the material, but others might have too much extracurricular stuff going on which would cause them to under-perform in classes. You've got to figure out what's going on and fix it because if you don't, then this problem will continue to plague you.

I wish I could give you a magic answer and say that if you did A, B, and C, your GPA would magically shoot to a 3.7 and you'll be accepted into whatever school you like... but alas, I'm just a random person on the internet. Go speak to some advisers and see what they say :)

[kaylee.]

Are you doing all those things concurrently? You stated that including trying to be a student, but you have the following committments:

- volunteer firefighter

- head lifeguard supervisor

- manage my fathers restaurant

- children's ski instructor

- volunteer mildly autistic 1/wk

- volunteer Pediatric ed.

Is there a reason you are doing so many activities? It seems like some sort of attempt to boost your resume.

If you are serious about nursing school then you need to prioritize this, and cut out some (alot of) extracurriculars. If they are for the purpose of looking good on paper, then you should especially scale back because this shows an imbalance of goals/priorities and will not win any points.

Being a professional volunteer is causing your grades are suffering greatly.

[angel0309, ADN, RN]

In my honest opinion, it seems like you need to take a step back and figure out why your GPA is so low. I think the first thing you need to look at is your extracurriculars. From what you described, it seems like you're doing a lot of extracurriculars and if you're really serious about nursing school, you need to focus on school. I understand that a lot of volunteer work and management positions look good on paper, but I know my school uses a very strict point system that is solely on your academic performance or TEAS score, nothing to do with your resume. I think you really need to figure out what exactly need to change in your life to get your GPA up. And, as mentioned above, the best advice on your next steps will come from academic/new student advisors at your desired schools.

[idkmybffjill]

I agree with everyone previous. You need to focus on your classes first and foremost and scale back on everything else. If you don't meet the minimum GPA, you won't even be considered for admission. Even then, you generally need quite a bit above the minimum to be accepted.

If you can do something like grade forgiveness, talk to your adviser about that. It would be easier to retake some of the classes you got a bad grade in than to try to improve your GPA by taking new classes.