I wanna be a nurse and i am confuse

student456 · Apr 14, 2008

if you want to be an registered nurse just go straight to RN school. I wouldnt reccomend to go for PSW as its a year long and its only around 12 bucks an hour. Id reccomend going to RN school as you learn all that psw stuff in your first semester anyway and then you have more career ops.

RPN is fine too if thats what you want to do. However, you do have to find a bridging program afterwards if you want to transition to be an RN and that may take a long time as i think its a year to bridge then 2 years of school. It doesnt matter what school you go to , as the requirement for RN's is now a BSCN even if you go to a college

Right now RPNS make around 23 $ an hr in ontario i believe and RN's start off at close to 27$ right now but we just signed a new contract that will go into effect now.

Any of the NS are good in ontario...where are you located in ontario...south, north, etc?

good luck!

Utopia · Apr 17, 2008

Hi there,

Obviously you ultimately want to become a registered nurse, and I would recommend not going for a practical nursing course first. First of all, I would say PN is one of the most competitive programs to get into in any school in Ontario because they only accept a handful of applicants, plus in order to become an RN if you are a PN you must obtain a bachelor of science in nursing degree or a bachelor of nursing degree. These bridging programs also have small amounts of seats available so it may be difficult to get accepted.

If you really want to become a registered nurse and don't have the required prerequisites, I would suggest just doing another semester or year in high school. Or, you could apply for a general arts and science program at a college and use your chem, bio and math credits as prerequisites. In a GAS program though, the fees are usually $2500 plus another $1500 or so for books. Personally, I would go back to high school and complete the required credits needed for the bachelor of nursing programs because, well, it's free!

Now, about prerequisites: most schools in Ontario require the same high school credits, which usually include:

ENG4U (University English)

SBI4U (University Bio)

SCH4U (University Chem)

MDM4U, MHF4U, MCV4U (University Math)

Plus an additional two U or M courses. Most schools require a minimum average of 70% or higher to even be considered. Nursing is a very tough program to get into at any school.

Also, some schools like Centennial, Humber, George Brown and Ryerson require either a grade 11 or grade 12 math.

I was actually a human resources student attending York. I hated it and guess what I did? Went to an alternative school to obtain a couple of high school credits to get into nursing. If you live in Toronto, here are some good places to check out to obtain those credits if you don't want to go back to your own highschool (usually you are required to take a minimum of 3 courses per semester):

Adult Day School (York) ................................416.394.2371

Emery C.I. (Adult Day School) ........................416.395.3225

Maplewood High School .................................416.396.6765

Burnhamthorpe Collegiate Adult Learning Centre .416.394.7145

Scarborough Centre for Alternative Studies .......416.396.6921

City Adult Learning Centre .............................416.393.9740

Yorkdale S.S. and Adult Learning Centre ...........416.395.3350

Adult Education ...........................................416.395.8080

Independent Learning Centre ..........................416.484.2704

Good luck :nuke: ! Nursing is a great career to get into. I always wanted to do it but was discouraged from many of my friends and family because they thought it would not be worth it. I'm glad I didn't listen to them.

Oh, and I believe if you have a PSW certificate you can only get into a practical nursing program. Check out this site if you want more info on that:

http://www.georgebrown.ca/Marketing/FTCal/nursing/S119.aspx

Utopia · Apr 17, 2008

http://www.cno.org/reg/nonmemb/progs_rn.htm

list of ontario schools offering RN programs

SuzieeQ · Apr 24, 2008

Hi Sarah,

I am in the Practical Nursing program in Ontario, Canada (to graduate in June this year). I also want to be an RN at some point, but I did not have the university credits to go straight from high school into university. If you are in the same situation, you could do what I am going to do. After completing the RPN course, you can bridge to the RN/BSCN program through university. Taking the bridging course full-time (straight through the summer) will be a 3 year course OR, taking it part-time (about 3-4 course per semester, also through the summer) will be a 5 year course.

I'm not sure how you plan on going from PSW to RN. You could upgrade from the PSW certificate to the RPN diploma, and then do the bridging to RN course.. but that would take about 10 years. If you can afford it, and have the university level credits in highschool, I would recommend going right into the RN/BSCN program... It'll be quicker, and less expensive! I hope this helped!:heartbeat