Is it just me? Or is this the nursing school homework hotline?

sharann, BSN, RN · Mar 22, 2001

Wow, talk about eating our young. I agree that some nursing students may be trying to get some easy answers here, but in general this is not the case. I am sad to see a post like yours LPN. The students here are part of the future of OUR profession. Theyu have a right to ask anything they want to. WE have the choice to answer what WE choose to as well. Maybe it was just you and your books when you were a student...Oh, do you remember being a student...or were you born experienced?

Not all of us have such dislike for students and new people.

MollyJ · Mar 22, 2001

I cannot say it happens every night for me, but there are often times when I come to this BB and I see questions posted by students and it appears they have done very little leg work before posting their question. I am proud to say that some of the most blatant attempts to get people to supply quick answers usually go unanswered OR people tell the poster where to go to get some ideas on their problem.

On the other hand, I remember the immensity of some questions and how sometimes I just couldn't figure out what the instructor wanted when they asked a certain question. I try to answer some of these questions with _more questions_ so that the poster will start to think about what they know about topic already and start to build on the question.

I agree also with the first poster that some of the posters seem not to have done the basics: read the text(s), gone to the library and hit the 'net. I put the net last because sometimes you cannot beat the info you will find in the first two sources and their seems to be a reluctance on some posters parts to go to those first two sources. When I was a student for the first time over 20 years ago, I would spend the evening (along with many of my colleagues) in my nursing school library and I would pour through books in search of information. Sometimes these searches became meandering reads where I started looking for one idea and ended up reading about 2 or 3 others.

I realize in this day of distance learning and students trying to juggle job, family and school that many of you won't have alot of access to a library, you won't have time to go there, or your library's quality isn't that good. Please don't start another fight here, folks, but I visited a library that served ADN students in my community while I was working on my MSN and I don't know how they wrote a care plan out of that library. One of my friends who was a teacher at that school said that the library was a consistent point for improvement when the state board came by to do surveys. And, if you are in a school served by an excellent library (as I was for my BSN and MSN) then count your blessings. A good nursing library that grants you access to the lit from other disciplines with decent inter-library loan system is expensive! Bless the taxpayers in our state.

Anyhow, the last thing I want to do is to discourage students from posting their questions to dialogue with experienced nurses. But know, students, that many of us will notice if you haven't done your work or if your trying to circumvent the thinking portion of your nursing homework. The student posters who I respect the most are the ones who succintly state their assignment and then synopsize their thinking on the subject and ask their question. The ones I respect the least are those that post a question like, "Where can I find information on (topic x)?" *Do I look like a search engine?*

On a given night, students and nurses have a way to dialogue about nursing that was unheard of in my youth. Also, I come here to repay the debt to the many nurses that helped me in my learning years. I wouldn't want to squelch that. But like I say to my 9 year old son: I'm not going to work harder on this project than you do.

Thanks for the post realnursealso/LPN

Betti23RN · Mar 22, 2001

I agree with Sharann. Yes, maybe it does seem as if students run here for answers that could easily be found in their books, but maybe they were just under the illusion that real life experience may better prepare them than textbook. I think that we all can remember how different text is vs. experience, and how we didn't really learn anything until we did it. Maybe some students who come here could easily get the answers from their books and are just doing things the easy way, but it's comments like these that will scare away those who truly need our help. I'm ashamed that nurses treat their replacement generation this way.

e-nurse · Mar 22, 2001

Being a new grad myself I find myself still asking tons of questions two months into my new job, and thankfully the collegues who I ask for help aren't crochity old bags who are unwilling to lend a hand. Your attitude sickens me and I hope to God that I always remember being the new grad/nsg student who was feeling overwhelmed, needed help, and wasn't afraid to ASK.

coolnurse21 · Mar 22, 2001

Hello I am a nursing student and have recently posted a need for help on an assignment I had. I was not looking for someone to do my homework for me, I was only hoping for some advice from experienced nurses that may know resources that I dont. I was startled when I read this reply and am glad that others do not have the same view as yours. Its attitude like yours that make me wonder if I want to enter a field that"supports" its new grads as you do.

lesliee · Mar 22, 2001

I'm less than a year into this profession myself, and just wanted to state for the record that during my last semester of nursing school, one of our assignments was to contact a nursing bulletin board and begin discussions, take polls, etc. We actually had to print out discussions that we were involved in for proof of having done the assignment. The idea behind this assignment was to get future nurses more familiar with computers since that's the way things are going. Without that assignment, I would have not sought out this sight - I would have missed a lot of valuable insight and humor.

Michelle_nurse · Mar 22, 2001

I am graduating in less than 2 months, and it is comments like this that discourage young nurses. Nursing school is alot of hard work and I find one of the hardest parts of clinical is dealing with staff that have attitudes such as this...(thinking students are a burden.) There is a shortage of nurses and with this attitude, it just makes nursing more difficult. Afterall we will be taking care of you, one day. I have never used this site as a "nursing school homework hotline". It never occured to me to use it for that. But just the same we need to have a medium to learn, experience doesn't come from air. Some tips are not in text books, they only come with experience. So please do not eat our young!!!

Stargazer · Mar 22, 2001

Okay, calm down, kids. I have seen other posts on this board by realnursealso and she doesn't make a habit of lunching on newbies. As I see that many of you, judging by number of posts, are brand-new to the board, maybe it would help if I explained that not too long ago we DID have a run of students clearly looking for handouts, who were not willing to do the legwork themselves and resisted all efforts of other posters (like MollyJ) to walk them through the process.

Molly explained it very well in her post--there are literally thousands of people on this board ready and willing to help you, as long as you demonstrate that you've tried to work through the assignment and have utilized other resources, but are just getting stuck at some point.

For my part, I envy you the luxury of having the internet--I can't even imagine how much faster I might've gotten my homework done if I'd had it, back in the "old days"-- :-)

For what it's worth, don't forget other avenues open to you, like (we tend to forget the obvious)the phone. If I was researching my pt's drugs for clinical the next AM and couldn't find one, I would call the hospital pharmacy. I found they were always friendly and willing to educate a student for a few minutes (it was late evening--maybe they were bored!), and frequently I would find that the pt was on an experimental drug that I would've had a very difficult time finding out about anywhere else. I even called my own opthalmologist and OB/GYN nurse practitioner (during the day)about complex related questions and found them willing to help, too. Michelle, congrats on your upcoming graduation.

mud · Mar 22, 2001

Some folks are sure bitter!! Eat any young lately?? Students.......Remember, this is not 20 years ago, times have changed!!! You are lucky to have this and other sites to come to for advice!! The real world is way different than any text book I ever had to study from!!! "REALNURSE", by the way, love your title, mine is "MUD". Glad I don't work with you!!! I never have written anything like this before, but you are a real sad specimen!! I seem to remember being encouraged to ask questions. Even being told that no question was stupid!!! Do all young nurses a favour, don't ever precept!! I am sure you are a superior nurse, with tons of knowledge and experience, too bad that nobody ever tought you how to share!!!

OBNURSEHEATHER · Mar 22, 2001

GOOOOOOOOOO MUD!

ShannonB25 · Mar 22, 2001

I am still a student myself but have gleaned so much invaluable information from this site and others like it. I am so grateful that it is available to me. I do tend to agree that while effort should be made on the part of the student, who better to ask about "real world" scenarios than veteran nurses like yourselves? For those of you who seem a bit irritated by posts requesting help, do please consider this. I remember the posting not too long ago by the student who behaved extremely immaturely and hadn't seemed to have done any thinking on her own regarding her homework questions. Trust me, as evidenced by most of the students who post here- we are NOT all like that. Many of us just want to be as well-rounded and prepared for nursing as possible.

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"The highest reward for man's toil is not what he gets for it, but what he becomes by it."-Johan Ruskin