I am a 16 year nurse with a majority of my career being spent in the pediatric intensive care unit. A year ago, I transitioned into the clinical educator position for my unit and began working on the completion of my BSN. I have now finished my BSN and am considering going on to obtain my master's degree (MSN-ED).
I am super excited to advance my education and career opportunities but I am also a little cautious. This is for multiple reasons. I love my job and could see myself doing this until my retirement. I am very interested in improving my abilities to be an effective educator in any way. However, I'm not sure there is much room for improving my rate of pay in my current role, even if I do get my MSN. Becoming a clinical nurse specialist would be something I am also interested in but, at the moment, there are no opportunities for this type of role at my hospital. I have never seen myself in academia before but, then again, I never expected to love being a clinical nurse educator so much either. I don't see myself as an NP at this juncture. I do not wish to work with adults and the NP field is fairly flooded around my area due to an abundance of nursing schools. I would say that the percentage of people I know with an NP in my area who are either employed as a bedside RN or who took a job they weren't necessarily interested in after obtaining their NP is around 35%.
Anyway, here's my question. If I commit to an MSN-ED and find that I can't recoup my investment, or want to move on into a different role, how difficult would it be for me to do this? Anyone have experience with obtaining an MSN-ED and then transitioning to a CNS role or NP role? Would I have to obtain a post-masters certificate? Just really looking to hear other people's experiences.
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Hello all!
I am a 16 year nurse with a majority of my career being spent in the pediatric intensive care unit. A year ago, I transitioned into the clinical educator position for my unit and began working on the completion of my BSN. I have now finished my BSN and am considering going on to obtain my master's degree (MSN-ED).
I am super excited to advance my education and career opportunities but I am also a little cautious. This is for multiple reasons. I love my job and could see myself doing this until my retirement. I am very interested in improving my abilities to be an effective educator in any way. However, I'm not sure there is much room for improving my rate of pay in my current role, even if I do get my MSN. Becoming a clinical nurse specialist would be something I am also interested in but, at the moment, there are no opportunities for this type of role at my hospital. I have never seen myself in academia before but, then again, I never expected to love being a clinical nurse educator so much either. I don't see myself as an NP at this juncture. I do not wish to work with adults and the NP field is fairly flooded around my area due to an abundance of nursing schools. I would say that the percentage of people I know with an NP in my area who are either employed as a bedside RN or who took a job they weren't necessarily interested in after obtaining their NP is around 35%.
Anyway, here's my question. If I commit to an MSN-ED and find that I can't recoup my investment, or want to move on into a different role, how difficult would it be for me to do this? Anyone have experience with obtaining an MSN-ED and then transitioning to a CNS role or NP role? Would I have to obtain a post-masters certificate? Just really looking to hear other people's experiences.