what is nursing school like?

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Specializes in babysitting.

what is the typical schedule like? do you all go mon thru fri 8 to 3 pm? do you have to do clinicals several times a week while you take courses? can you really work a fulltime job and go to nursing school and still get about 5 hours of sleep a nite?

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Nursing school is very demanding. At my nursing school, it was classes pretty much all day Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday 8am-4pm. We had clinical both Thursday and Friday either 7a-3p or 3p-11p. Most of the time not in class is spent studying, doing homework, and completing clinical paperwork. It is nearly impossible to go to school full time, work full time, and still get enough sleep at night. I worked per diem and tried to work one weekend shift a week.

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Specializes in Emergency/Trauma.
Nursing school is very demanding. At my nursing school, it was classes pretty much all day Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday 8am-4pm. We had clinical both Thursday and Friday either 7a-3p or 3p-11p. Most of the time not in class is spent studying, doing homework, and completing clinical paperwork. It is nearly impossible to go to school full time, work full time, and still get enough sleep at night. I worked per diem and tried to work one weekend shift a week.

exactly. i haven't seen my closest friends or family in about 2 months. nursing school is pretty much all your life will consist of for the entire duration.

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Specializes in chemical dependency detox/psych.

The above posters pretty much nailed it on the head.

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Every semester can be different. Some semesters are very demanding than others. You can expect at least one clinical day per week. Full time job will be hard to manage because the school work load is pretty heavy. I worked only PER DIEM as a CNA and probably worked no more than 3-4 shifts (8hours) a month... maybe more if there were holidays but I worked mostly on weekends.

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Specializes in Acute Care, CM, School Nursing.

Nursing school requires a lot of time and commitment. There were many, many nights in college where most of my friends were going out to party, and I was stuck home, doing schoolwork and going to bed early to get up for clinicals the next day. I would not recommend working full time during nursing school. I worked per diem throughout, maybe one day a week. It would have been a huge help to me if I didn't need to work at all. It's that difficult... I believe that I was usually able to squeeze all of my classes and clinicals into 4 days, so I'd have one day a week free.

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Specializes in Medical, Surgical, Pediatrics.

Nursing school is definitely time consuming and demanding, however, make sure that you make time for yourself. I went to a very competitive BSN program at my state university, and I still managed to work at the hospital 3-11 as a tech, I was very active in my social sorority, belonged to the nursing organization on campus, and still found time to spend with my boyfriend who went to college in a different town 3 hours away. I may not have been at the very top of my class, however, I still worked hard and graduated with a 3.6 and honors. I also got a great job that I had lined up before graduation. I guess it is all how you prioritize. Yes, I probably could have graduated with a 4.0, as some of my classmates, however, when I look back on it, I'm happy I did things the way that I did. I would rather be able to relax and spend time with friends and family, rather then all of my time studying and my head buried in a nursing book, like most of my classmates. I'm glad that I didn't let nursing school ruin my college experience. I have been working as an RN for about 16 months now, and I definitely feel confident in my abilities, and if I don't know something I ask. You are not gonna learn everything that you need to know in nursing school. A LOT will be learned when you are in the field. I hope this helps :)

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Specializes in Peds Medical Floor.

I work full time and it SUCKS. If you don't have to, don't. It can be done. It's just really hard. Gotta be on top of everything. I have no life other than work and school.

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I am in my first semester, and I work 16 hours per week: 8 hours on Saturday and 8 on Sunday. That is more than enough for me. It really cuts out some of my studying time. I would recommend no more than twenty hours a week. It is virtually impossible to work full-time, in my opinion. There are a few students in my class that are working 30 hours a week right now, and every single one of them are in the process of cutting their hours down to 20 or less or are quitting if they cannot do that. It's tough, but I would say to take out loans to cover the remainder of the money that you need and work part-time. I am in class every day of the week except for Tuesdays, but I have to go into the hospital to pre-lab on my patient that I have for my clinical day on Wednesdays. Good luck to you. Look into loans, grants, etc.

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Specializes in Critical Care.

Some of it will depend on what kind of student you are. I was in school 4 days out of the week. Either 2 days each of class and clinical, or some semesters were 3 days of class and 1 day of clinical. I worked full time. I worked 3 14's every week (so I actually worked at least 42 hours each week). I personally didn't find nursing school very difficult, so my clinical paperwork was the only thing I usually had to do for homework. But for people on the other end of the spectrum, who need many many many hours of studying each week, might not be able to work full time.

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Specializes in Medical Surgical Orthopedic.

For me it was like this:

1. Enroll (months ahead) in a class that meets Tuesday night between 4PM and 8PM.

2. The Sunday before class starts, get a call saying that the class time has been changed to Monday 6AM- 10AM

3. If you are not able to make the adjustment, sorry....we have no other class for you and you'll just have to sit the semester out

5. Oh! And the clinical site has changed. It is now an hour away from where you thought it was going to be.

6. We're still not sure who the instructor will be or where exactly you're meeting, but don't be late!

7. There is a drug calculations test the first hour of your first class, if you don't make at least a 90%, you'll have to drop the class

8. and make sure you've read chapters 1-14...well that's 1-14 in the old book.....you will have to figure out which chapters those correlate to in the new book (that we required you to purchase)

9. skills check offs and evaluations will be scheduled at odd times, on odd days...really, just anytime you planed to be doing something else

10. Oh! And all of your assignments are online. The password to access them is: "kjdhcus" ....aaand it doesn't work.

School was total chaos for meeee! I worked VERY part time, but I couldn't have even manged that if my employer had not been ultra-flexible.

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Specializes in neuro/ortho med surge 4.

The 4 semesters I had of JUST the nursing curriculum was 3 times harder than when I went full time for my business degree. I had all of the prereqs done. We lost more than half the class either due to grades or workload. The key to nursing school is perserverance. The concepts are not that difficult but it is the amount of work you have to do that is overwhelming. I remember for my first test in nursing 1 we had a test on 28 chapters of material.

Nursing school was very hard. I actually think being a nurse is much better. Most would not agree with me.

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