Orientation was done over zoom about a week before the semester started.
Don't feel bad, I don't mind helping at all! My situation was a little different since I was added to the program late. I had to do all of the background stuff (titers, drug test, order books and uniform, etc.) as fast as possible whereas they will give you guys around a month, if not more. I don't think there is anything really to do ahead of time.
You will switch classes every 8 weeks and will have different clinical sites every semester. So for the first 8 weeks, we had Fundamentals and now we have Med Surg (you will get a separate grade for both). I would say go into it not with the goal of getting A's. I know we all are used to getting A's or else we wouldn't even be able to get into the program but nursing school is a whole other situation. You have to have a 75% at the end of each 8 week class to move onto the next one. It sounds like no big deal but it is not easy. Especially that first 8 weeks. A lot of people barely passed and we lost 3 people in our cohort. However, once you get past those first 8 weeks, you are locked in and they will give you plenty of times to remediate if you get below that in the future. You just have to make it the first 8 weeks. Also, you will have to adjust your way of studying. There is no way possible that you can do all of the work we have. Right now we have about 40 chapters to read in a week and a half, 50+ quizzes, videos to watch and lectures to watch. And that's just for your Thursday/Friday class. So, you kind of have to learn how to focus on what to study on (something that I'm still figuring out).
I did not take HS 95 because by the time I added, it had already started. Honestly though, there is so much work to do that I wouldn't have taken it anyway.
How it works now is that on Mondays, we either go to campus and learn a skill (catheters, feeding tubes, etc.) or we stay at home and watch a video learning the skill and then record ourselves doing the skill and upload it to be graded. Tuesdays and Wednesday we have clinicals (for the first 3 weeks, you don't have clinicals but will have skills on campus). Thursdays and Fridays we either have a zoom lecture or we have a recorded lecture that we do on our own time. Think of it as 3 different classes almost. Skills, clinicals, and lecture.
I think it's challenging right now because of Covid. The professors say that if it wasn't for Covid, we would be on campus a lot more and take a lot more time learning skills, etc. Unfortunately due to Covid, we can only be on campus 10-20 at a time and are taught a lot of skills in a very short period. It's OK though. You'll learn a ton at clinicals.
I hope this helps. Feel free to ask any other questions you may have!
