Illinois Hospital tuition assistance

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I am interested to see if anyone has any resources on any Illinois hospital's tuition reimbursement benefit. I am beginning SLU's accelerated BSN program this month and am facing the reality that I may no longer be able to cover the costs of this program. I am receiving limited federal aid, and I am forced to look into other financial options. I know that many of the St. Louis area hospitals provided agreements with students to give them x amount of money for school in exchange for working for them for x amount of years. SLU Hospital had a great setup last year where they would give you $5,000 for each semester in exchange for 3 years of work. Then they would continue to help with outstanding loan balances each month while you continued your employment. This and more was what I was counting on last year when I applied and began working toward starting the accelerated program. Can anyone offer me any resources on what the current benefits are for tuition assistance from hospitals in Illinois? I have heard so many different things from so many different people. Some say that those benefits have been shut off entirely due to the economy, while some say that nursing students are still eligible. Then some say that only current employees working toward becoming a nurse are eligible. This is very stressful, and aside from sitting down and calling every single hospital system in the state, I don't know who to talk to. Financial aid staff at the school have little to offer on this subject, and I am beginning to think that I am simply going to have suck it up, scrape together a million loans, and graduate $50,000 in debt, in addition to my other loans from my previous degree. Any information anyone can offer would be tremendous.

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Specializes in Nephrology, Cardiology, ER, ICU.

The situation is rapidly changing. What hospitals offered last year or even last month might be radically different now. I live in central IL and all our hospitals have one by one eliminated tuition assistance, tuition paybacks, 401k contributions and many other benefits. One of our smaller hospitals just eliminated shift diff!

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in chicago, resurrection hospitals have some form of tuition reimbursement (my friend works there). advocate illinois masonic used to have it but not anymore. u can check out more details at reshealth.org.

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in chicago, resurrection hospitals have some form of tuition reimbursement (my friend works there). advocate illinois masonic used to have it but not anymore. u can check out more details at reshealth.org.

Are you sure that's true? I thought all the hospitals under Advocate offer the same benefits.

I work at Advocate Christ Medical Center and they offer both tuition reimbursement and the ACE program which is really good if your school participates. The ACE program I believe covers around $20,000 towards tuition (I maybe wrong on the exact $) & covers your books. You have to work for them after you graduate. If you use the tuition reimbursement ($1200 if you are .8 or below, I think they cover about $5,000 if you are full-time) you are not obligated to work for them.

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um i think there is some confusion on my post and i apologize for not being specific. advocate does offer tuition reimbursement for continuing education (i.e from cna to rn, rn to cns, etc), not for new grads (i.e. nursing students who just finished nursing school).

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I am going to be an out of state student starting an accelerated BSN program in Il. What exactly is the ACE program offered in Il? What does the ACE stand for and is there a website to get more information?

Thanks

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I forgot what the acronymn ACE stands for but the program is only available for Advocate employees.

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