Ughnamesarehard

Thanks for your response. I want sure how career ladders work. Do you get the next level in a career ladders as a result of your manager giving it to you, or do you apply for it?

Hi everyone, I was a little curious as to what the pay raise progression is like as a nurse? (I'm starting nursing school in the spring, and want to be a nurse regardless of the pay). I was just a bit curious as to how it compares to my current position in the as a hospital lab scientist where we all receive an average of less than one percent per year (it's been about 20 cents to 70 cents per year). I think this is going to be similar to what nurses get, but my coworkers in the lab say that nurses usually have larger raises due to career ladders and so forth (the lab doesn't have ladders or bonuses). For reference, I've been in my position for 7 years, and my raises have totalled about $5 in 7 years.

I was in the hybrid program, but decided to transfer to the in-person program for various reasons. We started with around 25 to 30 people I think, and lost a few in the first 3 - 4 weeks. Some people thought it'd be completely online- but we were at school for at least 3 days a week for many weeks. I think that didn't go over so well for the people who were trying to work full time- they didn't really tell us our schedule until orientation, and even then it was subject to change whenever they felt like it. Also they didn't give us any power points like the rest of the nursing programs get, so that really was a huge disadvantage!

Thanks!

To all of the Essex Day people, have they registered you for classes yet? I don't see anything registered in Simon for spring yet.

I know it was used for the Catonsville Hybrid program last semester. Not sure about future semesters or the day program though.

I saw something in the Essex Dosage course announcement section that said Examplify will reset for the next semester sometime on or after Dec. 31st. Maybe it will work after that day to sign up hopefully.

They have some info about Examsoft in the Student Nurse Connection on Blackboard. Examsoft is made by the company Examplify... that confused me a ton because people kept referring to it by two different names, but its just one program. I'm sure they'll give us more info about it later also. If you haven't enrolled in the Student Nurse Connection on Blackboard, here is how: Log into Blackboard, Click on the "Courses/Organizations" tab at top of page. In the "Course Search" box, type in "student nurse" and hit enter.Choose whichever campus you will attend (either Catonsville or Essex). This is very important because they are two separate programs.Once you're enrolled in the Student Nurse Connection, you can click on it and scroll towards the bottom of the main page. You should see a link called "ExamSoft Mandatory Module" that has all the info you need. This is probably jumping ahead though ? I am sure we will get more official details at the other orientation! There is a ton of good info in there if you like to read ahead. By the way... did anyone else in Essex day get registered for classes yet in Simon? I have not yet.

Are you Essex Day? I am Essex day and haven't been able to use the code yet either as of this morning.

I was in that cohort! I totally get the overwhelmed feeling you had, I felt very lost the entire time. I did end up passing my exams up until the point that I withdrew, but many other people failed and had to go to mandatory tutoring. I think what helped me the most for the exams was looking up each online module's objectives, answered them, and then I used them like a study guide. If you try to just read the books straight through, you will never have enough time. My biggest issue with that program was the lack of communication and all of the wrong information/ software codes (many were out of date and we couldn't access them to do homework, and when your teachers don't email you back for a few days at a time, you tend to panic when you can't access your homework through their software). Whatever you do, start working on your modules as soon as they open and start working ahead if you can. If you fall behind you will never catch up.

Do we have to attend all 3 orientations, or do we choose one date? (Also, I got into Essex day, yay!).

This was for the online program, and some of these were the"recommended" books. I'm not sure exactly where everyone will start, but most of our work was done in the fundamentals book and the med-surg book. We had to be ready to take a dosage exam about 2 months into the program though, so dosage is a must.

We used almost every single textbook! Some of them are reference books though, like your lab test manual and pharmaceutical meds manual. It's a TON of reading and studying, so when they give you "optional" textbook readings at orientation that you can read to get a head start on, be sure to do it. Here's a picture of my textbooks for the first semester... Keep in mind you will use many of these throughout the program, but you do have to buy a few more late in the program.

I've attached a screenshot of the dosage book info from the Catonsville campus Ccbc bookstore; I'm not sure if Essex has a different one. It's "Dosage Calculations" by Gloria Pickar, 9th edition.

Yes, you do, however many of the books have an "e-book" version that you can buy that is often less expensive than the hard copy. For example many of our books are published by Elsevier, so you can go to the Elsevier website and buy the e-book version of the book for $94 instead of $116 (for example, this is our fundamentals book: https://evolve.elsevier.com/cs/product/9780323400053?role=student ). The textbooks are not sold only in the bookstore; they are also sold by the publisher/ in other bookstores/ on Amazon, ect. Don't worry, they will go into great detail about books in the orientation! My main point is that me and my classmates found the ebooks easier to transport and faster to use.