Nursing Instructors Would Rather see You Fail than Succeed

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I have experienced this with almost EVERY nursing instructor I had.

I can honestly say they would rather see you fail than succeed.

Has anyone else experienced this ?

And, just to point out something, I did not say every single instructor. I said "almost every instructor".

'Almost every instructor' is closer to every instructor than the one single instructor you provided an example for. What about the others?

Did you withdraw before or after you found out that the instructor was going to be removed as a clinical instructor?

Perhaps she should have told you about your error when it occurred and not a month later so that you can learn from it, but she didn't and it doesn't absolve you from the responsibility of that error. I don't doubt that it's frustrating. When I make a mistake, I want to know about it asap so I can make sure I never make the mistake again. At my former job, I was audited all of the time. Granted it was in medical billing and not people's lives. I had times where it'd be a month or so until I found out about an error, so who knows how many more times I made that same error. Year ago, it took two years for them to correct me on something. I was fuming because I could've prevented making that same error for two years, but it doesn't change the fact that I'm still held accountable to that error, regardless of when they told me.

I know it's kind of apples to oranges because we're talking about patient's safety and lives compared to putting in an incorrect message when billing out a claim. But it sounds like the school is taking whatever steps they need to make your instructor accountable for her own errors.

Yes, sometimes you DO get a bad instructor. My previous school had one. I withdrew before she was terminated; however, I also decided that school wasn't for me regardless of the instructor. My former classmates have stayed and pushed through regardless of the issues they had with her. However, you may run into small issues (or maybe big?) issues no matter where you go. There may always be one instructor you don't get along with or agree with whether it's your grade, clinical experience, or you just don't get along with period. If becoming a nurse is what you want, sometimes you do just have to keep your nose down and push through.

If you've decided that the school wasn't for you, it's probably best not to waste more time there, but know that you may run into other issues at any other school. Instructors are human. They're not perfect, but I also don't think that they are purposefully out to see students fail unless there's a good reason that student should fail. When you do have those more difficult instructors, keep your nose down and push through it if nursing is what you really want to do.

The bottom line is that bad instructors are really the exception, not the rule, and when you do have those bad instructors, sometimes you just do what you have to do to get through the course / program.

I hope you find that you have instructors that don't make you feel like they are wanting to see you fail because I can guarantee that the vast majority want to see you succeed.

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Hey everyone,,,I just had a lightbulb go off in this feeble brain of mine!

I went to the wrong school! Thanks so much for all your answers and feedback !

I really appreciate it !

:confused: huh??

That's what you've understood after all the advice that seasoned nurses on an have offered to you? Erhm..wrong instructor, wrong school... what's next? All those allegedly terrible instructors that you've talked about have one thing in common - you! Maybe some introspection is in order.

GrnTea is right about "that one student". We had one in our cohort, this student would do anything to re-do a failed practical exam, started petitions, etc.

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Specializes in Family Nurse Practitioner.
We had one in our cohort, this student would do anything to re-do a failed practical exam, started petitions, etc.

Yeah and that usually works out in their favor, not. I was most impressed by Tinynurse2be's post who added their experience, as a student who had failed a class, and moved forward without blaming everyone else.

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Specializes in Hospice.
One question,,why on earth do you they would do that? For kicks??

mc3

From looking over OP's past posts, apparently s/he entered an LPN to RN program last year.

Guessing it wasn't as easy as s/he thought it would be, and this is the fallout.

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Specializes in Hospice.
Uh... What? I can't tell if this is sarcasm or what is going on.

Not sarcasm, just indignation at not getting the desired response from the rest of us.

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Specializes in Hospitalist Medicine.
Wow....I can see that a lot of nursing instructors answered here and I guess I should not be surprised that they are of

the opinion that it really isn't them its the student.

well ...I had a nursing clinical instructor who was going to be removed from teaching clinicals due to

many, many, complaints about her.

So when there were two weeks left of clinical (for the semester) she told me she had seen me

do something unsafe a month earlier, and had the write up in her office waiting for me.

She was very pit bull like, and she was not interested in my side of things whatsoever.

I withdrew from class.

So to all you clinical instructors who took the time to answer this post, why don't you do me a favor and answer the following

question....How does waiting a MONTH to issue me a safety write up, benefit my learning? Is it better for me to be in the dark

for a month about my mistake and perhaps continue making the SAME mistake, than to issue me the warning the same day it

happened?

I imagine it is.

No, she shouldn't have waited a month to document a safety error or even verbally mention it to you. However, why would you withdraw from a class 2 weeks before it was over? I know at our school, there is a cut off date for withdrawal (a week after mid-semester), so I find it hard to believe that you were allowed to withdraw at that late of a date. Something about this just doesn't add up to me. I can see you're upset about your experience, but having a bad experience with one instructor does not mean that ALL nursing instructors are like that.

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Specializes in Emergency.

No. I had no instructors who wanted people to fail. The operative word is "wanted". They would fail those who deserved it, but this was not done out of malice.

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Specializes in M/S, LTC, Corrections, PDN & drug rehab.
Not sarcasm, just indignation at not getting the desired response from the rest of us.

Thanks. It was just so bizarre!

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Hey everyone,,,I just had a lightbulb go off in this feeble brain of mine!

I went to the wrong school! Thanks so much for all your answers and feedback !

I really appreciate it !

Actually, going to the wrong school really can give you an all around bad instructor experience. There are some schools that can't seem to keep teachers longer than a year and the teachers usually aren't qualified. I've heard horror stories about that. What kind of school are you going to?

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Specializes in ICU.

As a current student, I can say that I have not had one instructor that wanted me to fail. Clinical instructors included. I see a lot of people come in and talk about getting written up at clincial, is that a common practice? I have never heard of that. Do some schools not give students the support they need at clinical?

At the beginning of every semester, I get really nervous before clinical. I always wonder what the instructor expects us to know and not know and where we are skills wise. Some of the skills I haven't got to practice since Fundamentals last fall. And every semester when I talk to my clinical instructor they always make me feel great about their expectations with skills. They will be there to talk to us and we can ask as many questions as we want. They will never say anything negative in front of the patient so the patient does not lose confidence in us, that if they see us doing something wrong, they will stop us and talk to us but not in front of the patient. It's always reassuring to me as the student that our clinical instructors expect us to be students.

That being said, we better be on time, look and act professional, and do our work. Those things are not up for debate. If you are late, you can get sent home. If you are not in your uniform and dressed to the standards set out before us such as hair up, one set of stud earrings, name badge, white shoes, we are sent home. We need to have our preclinical work done when we get there and all postclinical work turned in the following week. Those are pretty basic and simple though.

In clinical though, I have yet to see anyone really get told they were unsafe or doing something wrong. I have never not been able to ask a question and our instructors are there for anything we pretty much do. Med passes, IVs, catheters, etc. I can do vitals on my own and glucometer checks on my own because I checked off on both of those in front of my instructor last semester. At my school, our instructors are extremely supportive and their doors are always open to us. Maybe I'm one of the lucky few, but I know they deal with a lot of crap especially from students, and I don't think they should be bashed. They should be praised for what they do.

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I must have hit the jackpot.

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I am so glad my experience was a positive one. Now that's not to say it wasn't hard or stressful because it was one if the hardest things I have ever done. It was also one of the most character building, positive and exciting times of my life. We're the instructors hard? YES! I wonder why let's see because we hold lives in our hands everyday and they need to know we can handle the heat. People would you want a nurse that cracks under pressure or one that can excel in that moment where most would panic? My instructors were incredible, intelligent people who celebrated every accomplishment maybe not with a banner but a smile and a nod. Certainly felt like a ticker tape parade to me.

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