Instructional certified school nurses

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Specializes in med-surg, IMC, school nursing, NICU.

Hi everyone,

I’ve been out of the school nursing game for a few years since moving to a state (Jersey) where a certificate was required. I am in my second to last semester of earning said certification and in the beginning of my “student teaching internship” for the instructional SN cert that is not required in NJ but was heavily pushed by my professors.
I was wondering if anyone else here took the instructional route, either in NJ or elsewhere, and what the student teaching portion was like. So far it seems pretty disorganized (like the rest of my program but that’s a story for another day) with no clear expectations except for the number of hours required to spend student teaching. It’s still not clear if I’m supposed to be writing my own lesson plans, following the teacher’s curriculum etc. I’m not sure if this is typical, just curious about what everyone else’s experiences were.

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Specializes in school nurse.

I'm going to step out on a limb and guess that the instructional pathway is longer and more of a money maker for the university. Is that the case?

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Specializes in med-surg, IMC, school nursing, NICU.
On 2/2/2020 at 4:29 AM, Jedrnurse said:

I'm going to step out on a limb and guess that the instructional pathway is longer and more of a money maker for the university. Is that the case?

It’s actually not although that would make a lot of sense lol. It’s one extra class that I am taking concurrently with another course that is required for graduation. From what I can gather they say it has something to do with having nurses certified to teach ensures we will always be placed on the teacher’s pay scale, resulting in better financial security as a profession. It just seems a little odd to me since I have literally never encountered a school nurse who teaches classes.

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Specializes in school nurse.
52 minutes ago, JerseyTomatoMDCrab said:

It’s actually not although that would make a lot of sense lol. It’s one extra class that I am taking concurrently with another course that is required for graduation. From what I can gather they say it has something to do with having nurses certified to teach ensures we will always be placed on the teacher’s pay scale, resulting in better financial security as a profession. It just seems a little odd to me since I have literally never encountered a school nurse who teaches classes.

Also, most health offices are busy enough that teaching class on top of that would really pile on the work...

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Specializes in med-surg, IMC, school nursing, NICU.
On 2/3/2020 at 7:29 AM, Jedrnurse said:

Also, most health offices are busy enough that teaching class on top of that would really pile on the work...

LOUDER FOR THE PEOPLE IN THE BACK!
I know when I was a SN out of state I couldn’t even leave my office to eat lunch let alone teach classes. It seems so silly.

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Specializes in school nursing, ortho, trauma.

I didn't go for the instructional cert. I intentionally stopped taking classes just short of the instructional class and sent my transcripts into the state and they sent me my cert. TBH though, i think mine DOES say that i'm instructional. Maybe something in my transcripts made that happen. I got hired at a public school still using my "emergency cert" status, finished up one class then i was set. When I was going through it, the school i went to referred to it as dual cert SN and teacher of health.

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