RNonymous

I've been working and going to school, sometimes 30+ hours a week, but that is also because my supervisors worked with my class hours. One thing to consider is training time - on top of having new classes and assignments, can you take on also learning a new job? The job experience of working in the healthcare field while going to school has been really great for me, especially if it's in a field that you enjoy and is challenging. However, you know how much you can handle!

Wow, this is my first post on AllNurses, though I have been reading threads for so many years now whenever they show up in my Google search results for problems. So here it goes. I'm in an ADN program right now, though I have a Bachelors in a different field from another college, and I'm feeling as though I'm going to hit the floor after (hopefully) passing boards next summer as a new RN totally inept at basic things. Our program does not have a lot of clinical time, and a part of me feels like it's the minimum they can do due to the local squeeze of availability for sites from different colleges. I have a 4.0 in the program, but when I'm on Med/Surg, I feel like a huge dunce. Simple things like "go get this person cleaned up and assessed" suddenly become a huge project. I'm so afraid that I can be "book smart" and then not apply it to where it actually counts, and end up missing things and hurting a patient. In some places I feel really comfortable, but it just seems like Med/Surg is Thunderdome to me; I never feel comfortable there and it always seems like that's the starting point for all nurses. The other issue is that we are a rural hospital, so there aren't a lot of good learning experiences sometimes. Does anyone have some words of wisdom? Sometimes I can remind myself that when you get your first nursing job, it sounds like the training can be weeks of basically one on one clinical with a staff nurse and you learn what nursing is actually like then. I also work in a Dialysis unit, so that has given me a lot of great experience. However, other times I feel like our program isn't preparing us sufficiently. Just the usual doubt of a nursing student. :)