greenbluegray

Yes, in order to be a good nurse you do need to learn the material, but fast tracked programs like this make it tough. Failing one class is not the end of the world- it happens. You can fail a class and still become a great nurse. So while knowledge and critical thinking are undoubtedly important, so is humility. No one wants to work with a know-it-all contrarian, and snide remarks certainly do not foster the collaborative and supportive environment that is so crucial to successful nursing.

No, you can drop a class without dropping out of the program but you will be held back to repeat it. For example, the people that failed our complex clients class in semester 3 are currently repeating it while taking 3 of the 5 classes for semester 4. So they will graduate a semester later. I also think you can maybe only drop 2 classes throughout your time in the DEMSN, but I don't know if that is true. And yes, I would agree that most of the professors are terrible at answering emails. What class did you need to drop? Do you have a phone number for that professor or can you attend their office hours?

I really don't recall for pharm. I think she might included some of the case studies in the final grade, but check your syllabus or ask the professor directly if you're still unclear.

katoo, Yes, that is true. Lots of people in my cohort failed classes and either dropped out of the program or were held back, and I think the same will be true for this semester. A lot of people have been failing the advanced skills exams. I think if you were only focused on passing assessments, you might not learn as much as you think. It is rare I say anything nice about this program, but I do think some of the projects, particularly the ones you do independently, can reinforce material well if you put effort into completing them.

Or maybe until you spent more than a mere 4 weeks enrolled? ? Anyway... good luck to all the new students! Hope your experiences are better than mine!

Wow, crazy that all the bad things I said about this program a few months ago turned out to be true… Who would have thought?! ? keyzlocs, I wouldn’t count on taking your NCLEX while still in school. You are not going to have time the prepare if you are a full time student. You may pass the predictor exam and be registered as eligible to sit, but I wouldn’t recommend it without a lot of extra studying outside of school. The NCLEX is expensive and you probably don’t want to have to take it more than once. Also, you probably won’t have much time to work. Most in my cohort quit working early in the 3rd semester, and the ones that haven’t are always very stressed.

katoo, Don't quote me on the price. Whatever they told you is probably correct. It's been a year since I looked at tuition for this, I just know I have a fat pile of student loans totaling around 60k for this program.

summer123, They might say they offer NCLEX prep but it is not entirely true. NCLEX prep is done independently in semester 3 or 4 depending on how COVID has affected your class timeline. You do take the NCLEX before graduating, again after semester 3 or 4 depending, but to my understanding you do not have to pass it to continue in the program. If you are working as a nurse extern you might need to pass in order to keep your position, but if that doesn’t apply to you then don’t worry about it. You can always take the NCLEX a second time if needed. Pass/fail is typical in a lot of graduate nursing programs. You will need a minimum of 80% in each class to pass (expect the first patho class, which is 70% because it is not part of the school of nursing). Grades are mostly based on exams, which are referred to as “assessments”. There are other assignments in each class as well, but these generally do not count towards your grade. Assignments are generally evaluated as either “satisfactory” or “in progress” and you will need to revise any “in progress” feedback to meet the requirements for “satisfactory”. What this means is that you must do well on your exams to pass classes. Also, I am unsure of the "retakes" mentioned earlier in this thread. Neither my patho or pharm class offered any sort of retake for any assessment, nor did they drop the lowest score. None of my classes at this school have offered that. It might depend on the professor or they might have implemented it because a lot of people were failing. Londonflo, We are required take the NCLEX before we graduate from the MSN portion of our program. It is not an option of eligibility to sit for it if we so choose. Katoo, I can tell you as someone who is wrapping up my 3rd semester that this program is largely self taught. Some of your classes will have Zoom meetings, some will provide recorded material for you to watch asynchronously, but many classes are asynchronous without any type of lecture or interaction with the professor. I have never seen 3 of my 6 professors this semester, 2 of which did not provide any sort of lectures, video, or audio recordings. There is a lot of Youtube, a lot of TED talks, and a lot of PDFs. I find that the cost of this program is entirely unjustified. For $60,000+ I expected a lot more effort on the part of my professors, especially considering the complications of COVID. This was not offered as an online program so the fact that it has become one, and especially one with such limited interaction, does not sit well with me. COVID has made it difficult, but I and many other students feel like professors take advantage of it in a negative way.

Londonflo, I'm now in my third semester. My first semester was 100% online with some of the courses rearranged between the second semester and the first semester to accommodate that it would be online. 2 of those 5 courses, pharmacology and pathophysiology, had pretty good lectures recorded to watch on your own. My pharmacology class was very disorganized though! 2 of the other courses, evidence based practice and nursing ethics, had a few pop up zoom meetings for clarification on topics. I really felt like ethics and the remaining course, nursing essentials, were just busy work and were self taught. My second semester was a hot mess. We took our clinical skills the same time we took our first clinical (at a hospital) and because we hadn't passed each skill yet, we weren't allowed to do anything in practice. We never made up the clinical section we were displaced from the first semester, other than taking the math exam, but we paid for it in full and received credit for it. Many of us were really unhappy about missing the experience and being so limited in the experience we did have. My clinical instructor and my skills instructor had never taught a single class before, and correspondence with the rest of the department to figure things out was beyond stressful for everyone, teachers and students. There truly was a new issue every week. Those classes did meet in person, though one was very bad about practicing COVID guidelines, particularly in the classroom setting (too many students, no social distancing, people taking masks off during class, not disinfecting tables, dummies, etc). The remaining classes I had were totally online with the exception of some exams being done in person. 2 of the lecturers were pretty good, the other 2 were extremely uninvolved, 1 of which was also brand new to teaching. Now that I've begun my third semester, I can say the course material has shifted away from science and skills. 1 class meets in person for simulations, my "clinicals" meet in person (we are supposed to be a vaccine clinic but we have never gone), and the other 4 are totally online. There is very little interaction from the professors in most of these, and it is frustrating. You can tell that the professors did not design the courses or the online pages they are in charge of and there is a lot of disorganization and confusion. Most of the girls dislike the format and, in this BSN portion of the DEMSN, we were expecting more lectures or synchronous classes, online or in person. I am only the second cohort, the first cohort has not graduated yet so there is no info on NCLEX pass rates or anything else, but general consensus is we feel very unprepared. I don't know what classes would have met in person or how else the program would have been different if not for COVID, but I for one would not recommend it to anyone. I hope this answers your questions.

Yeah so I can tell that you're not someone I want to keep having a conversation with. I'm not interested in defending my valid experiences to a stranger on the Internet who thinks he knows better. Nothing I say is even remotely untrue or unwarranted and your experience being positive doesn't negate my experiences or the shared experiences of my cohort. Word of advice, if you're thinking you want to be a nurse, get out of the habit of trying to discredit others. You are going to have a hell of a time building rapport with patients with your current attitude. Also why do you keep comparing this program to med school? Nursing school is not med school, nursing and medicine are foundationally different, and the way med programs are run have no bearing on this program.

They do offer a lot of study groups, I think there’s now one for every class. They are typically student led. I wouldn’t say any of the professors are rude, more that there is not a strong presence in presenting material. We don’t even have many actual classes, it is asynchronous online learning. You will mostly be teaching yourself.

I’m in my 3rd semester of the DEMSN and I can assure you it is awful and it keeps getting worse. My grades are great so I promise you I’m not an angry, failing student- the program really is awful. Covid presents a lot of challenges but even outside of that, the program is extremely disorganized. There is poor communication amongst all the faculty and it affects students quite a bit. Most of your classes will be online and you will be teaching yourself. Many of the professors do not even provide a zoom class or a recording. There is very limited interaction, just sloppy powerpoints they took from the BSN curriculum and links to 20+ articles online. Many of the professors, especially for the first 2 semesters, are brand new to teaching and don’t know what they’re doing. The clinicals are an absolute joke and are basically like any other class in that you just write papers and do projects. You might get to go to a hospital a couple times in semester 2 but you won’t be doing much other than filling out paperwork. They made a lot of changes due to covid, but they still charged the full tuition price! It’s a lot to explain, but basically we paid for a clinical class we never actually took- we just got the credit for it. If you just want a degree then who cares, but if you actually want to learn? Not OK. They also cut 4 weeks (¼ of the semester) and material off all our classes but still charged full prices. It is a masters program but your first 3 semesters are BSN courses, doled out as 14-18 credits a semester. It is an unreasonable amount of work, and we all cut a lot if corners to just get it done. We are not truly learning, we’re just skating by until graduation. We all feel very unprepared. There is no NCLEX prep either. The cohort started with 55, and I know at least 7 have dropped. It’s a small group so we all talk, and everyone has the same complaints. Maybe of us have written the dean about issue after issue, but nothing improves. I could go on and on. Nurses schools across the country are in bad shape (from what I hear) but go somewhere else. This place is not worth the enormous undue stress.

Chubby bunny, I think it’s more about the flow rate rather than the actual amount of time. 0.5 hours was the time in which they needed 100 mL and 100mL in half an hour is the same flow rate as 200mL in 1 hour. They were a little tricky on that one but I hope that helps.

I got the same for the math, 1.2, 200, and 16. My work was a disaster because I initially did questions 1 and 2 wrong and crossed so much out ? For the essay I picked the second situation with the victim of domestic violence/headaches. I mentioned my time as a youth volunteer in a shelter for domestic violence and wanting to apply that experience in a healthcare setting. I said it would be challenging to not be able to “fix” the problem and to not let my sad feelings on the situation seep into my personal life. I think I said I would hope to learn more about the patients perspective and to learn coping mechanisms for myself. I don’t think I wrote the worst essay, but I don’t feel super confident about it. ? Writing under pressure has never been my strong suit but hopefully my entire application is solid enough.