Nurse doing JD: Advice

[steven007, BSN, MSN]

Hi everyone!

So, I am reaching out to my fellow nursing brethren for advice, as I feel this topic is best addressed by them.

So I have recently been accepted and confirmed my acceptance to a JD (Juris Doctor or Law Degree) program. What I want to do with this is irrelevant to my question, so I will spare you the details on that.

But what I want to share is my attempts to land employment. This law school is located 16 hours from my current city and located very remotely, with not a lot of surrounding cities. It is a metropolitan city, but the fact is it is metropolitan in the midst of desolate nothingness. I currently have a really nice, full time job as a nurse manager in a large hospital. I don't want to give this up, move to this city and hope to find employment; because, I am paying cash for this degree. I already still have student loans from my BSN and MSN that I am paying off, I don't want to incur more debt from this JD. I can afford to pay cash for it (with working my butt off and a little help from my parents) and that's what I want to do.

So I can't just make a rash decision to quit my job, move there and hope to land a job. I have looked in the area and, while there are TONS of nursing jobs, there are little to no jobs in my clinical area of expertise (psychiatry). But there are various other positions, such as med surg, ICU, ER, float, etc. I have applied for 2 positions as the two hospitals in the area. But I feel like I have maybe jumped the gun. I want to be judicious in my applications for employment because I don't want to be denied because of my location or my not having relocated yet, but I also don't want to put myself in a position where I need to apply for a job as soon as I arrive and hope to god I find something before the school year starts. I have given notice for my home (I rent thankfully) and am moving into my RV within the months to save some extra money and give me a little more freedom should I be offered some form of employment in my area. But I am also worried about indicating that I am going to law school. I don't want my future employer to think "he's not going to have any time for us being a law student". Because the truth of the matter is, I have no choice but to make time for the employer, I am not living off of student loans. This I can clearly explain to them but they have to call and be interested in me first. I considered not indicating that I am going to law school but then it makes it look weird and abnormal (why someone would wanna move there from where I currently live, with the type of job I currently have for the type of job I would be applying for). In my cover letter I explain that I will be relocating to do the law degree and that I am planning to relocate in August but willing to sooner on finding employment.

SO my questions to you are:

1) My desired time for relocation is in August. Is it too early now (end of April) to be applying for jobs?

2) Should I be indicating that I am a future law student? Or should I indicate something about further my academic career or something more vague?

3) Should I include anything else in my cover letter? Like that I am motivated/needing to work part time and not just planning to work 1 shift here and there?

4) Any other suggestions you would give to me finding employment?

Perhaps I should have put this under a nursing career post. Not sure though, its been a long time since I used this site. But I am feeling kind of isolated/alone during this process. its really hard and scary going from one profession/career to another, and being one of very few people who make this transition. So it is really comforting to reach out to fellow nurses for advice :)!

Thank you in advance

[AnnieNP, MSN, NP]

First, congratulations on your acceptance to law school. I am no expert in hiring or job searching, but I'm not sure why they need to know you are going to law school or why you are relocating. You could be looking to move there for any number of reasons, marriage / spouse 's job / family. Good luck to you, I'm surer there are others here who will have some good advice.