Airina

Hahaha, of course. When I was applying for bridging, and even doing specialty placements, I had no info so I would love to offer any information that I can. I did the NCSBN course and UWorld. The NCSBN course was super cheap because of COVID (bought it for $20 CAD), and offered a pretty good review and question bank. UWorld was okay, it helped with critical thinking and answering select-all-that-applies type questions, but I wouldn't say it was essential for passing the NCLEX. I only spent like 2 weeks studying for the CPNRE by doing practice questions, reviewing each question's rationale and why the other answers were wrong. I also did that when I studied with UWorld for NCLEX, but I spent about a month studying. Humber doesn't have any mandatory classes for NCLEX prep, we kind of were left to do that for ourselves. But really, the content that they teach were on par with what was on the NCLEX. It was actually way more detailed than the NCLEX. I think I really learned true critical thinking through some of Humber's courses. It wasn't really SickKids that considered the GPA, but Humber themselves. They wanted to place the students who were really interested in SickKids, and only wanted the best of the best there. In the end, you're representing the school, so of course they wouldn't want someone who is barely passing doing their placement there. Also, this was a group placement, so you're in a group of 7 with 1 clinical teacher doing your placement there. During 4th year 1st semester, they have a meeting with everyone in 4th year and talked about specialty placements for consolidation. You fill out a form asking about your top 2 choices for units, then submit it with your resume and a cover letter to your program coordinator. The program coordinator tries to accomodate as many students as possible, but that doesn't always happen. The higher your GPA, the higher your chances of getting a specialty unit. If you don't get a specialty placement, you participate in HSPnet, so you'll be randomly placed. Just a note, SickKids also has a consolidation form you can fill out. In this case, it is SickKids that chooses you to be a consolidation student at their facility. In my year, they didn't allow us to apply to a specialty and SickKids, which I still don't understand, but that's just the rules for my year. I heard it was different for previous years, so it might change. From what I know, no one had an interview for specialty placements. Not sure about the SickKids one though. For consolidation, we had to complete 468 hours, plus any missed clinical hours throughout the program. I got about 370 hours in mid-March, before COVID happened. UNB decided because of that, we were eligible to graduate without finishing the rest of our hours (luckily). Overall, the bachelor's program requires 1400 hours of clinicals, but as a PN graduate, you are credited 450 hours, which means you need 950. The placements you get will help you finish your hours in no time, so don't panic about how many hours you have to do. I believe Humber has the most number of clinical hours for a nursing program in the GTA (please correct me if I'm wrong), which is definitely a plus. I didn't really purchase any textbooks throughout my program. In the PN program, they included the cost of online textbooks through Elsevier in our tuition, which was about $1000 I believe, and those were the same textbooks I used through the Bachelor's program as well. From what I remember, we used: - Maternal Child Nursing Care in Canada - Canadian Fundamentals of Nursing - Medical-Surgical Nursing in Canada (I used this A LOT) - Physical Examination & Health Assessment - Polit and Beck Canadian Essentials of Nursing Research (This book wasn't included in the PN program, but I used my friend's copy so I didn't buy it) I was an 80's student in PN, and that didn't change in the bachelor's program. But I also worked a lot harder in the bachelor's than I did in college and studied way more. I think with your grades, you'll be fine. I found the nursing courses, like acute health challenges, covered the same kind of info as in the PN program, but in a lot more details and requires you to connect pathophysiology to the actual condition. For example, for any condition, what is really happening in your body that causes these clinical manifestations? Whereas PN was: what are the interventions for this condition? There wasn't really a rationale we needed to give in PN. Transitions class was really just going over some nursing theories (like change theory, etc) and essay writing, no exam just a final group presentation. I think it was hard because the prof I had was super hard as a marker. My friend who took bridging the following year had a much easier prof, so he did way better. My advice is really to talk to your prof, have them go over your essay or even your ideas. Also, bringing it to the writing centre would be helpful too. There was quite a bit of essay writing, but I haven't seen an essay weighing more than 40% of your course grade. It might actually be less than that from my memory. For courses like acute health challenges and complex issues, they were 2 midterms (25% each), 2 quizzes (usually around 2.5% each), and a final exam (45%). Don't expect this though, Humber is always changing up their courses to make them better. When I had community health nursing, it was 1 midterm, 1 essay, and 1 exam. A LOT of people failed this course and were complaining about it. The following year when my friend took it, they had seminar presentations added into the course and almost everyone did really well overall. I did not get hired at my consolidation. It was a great unit with great nurses, but management didn't seem supportive, and I was not a huge fan of that, so I applied elsewhere and got in there. From what I've seen, it's difficult to get into maternity and peds without any experience. Peds jobs are actually kind of rare from what I'm seeing right now. But who knows, it might change when you graduate. My advice if you really want to get hired on your unit is to make sure the manager knows who you are, as well as the unit educator. They're your ticket in if they like you. Introduce yourself during the first week of your placement and just check in from time to time. True, with COVID going on and with everything being virtual, it'll suck. But the good news is that you at least get to sleep in! No 8am classes at least LOL Honestly, I really enjoyed going to Humber, even though I self-taught a lot. The profs were actually very supportive and the program prepared me very well for NCLEX. Only downside is the parking situation is a little crazy, but if you bus, then you're good LOL Hope some things are cleared up for you. And of course, let me know if you have any other questions!

Thank you! I did do my PN through Humber. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe this is the first year that Humber is accepting Seneca students. When I was admitted, it was only reserved for Humber grads. Where did you do your PN? I got my authorization to test in mid-May from Pearson Vue and was able to write at the end of June. When I was booking, they had just loosened restrictions, so there were a ton of dates opened. It's no problem whatsoever! I'm just going to answer your questions based on how you numbered: 1) I wish I knew how much work it would be and how independent I had to be. Your grades actually matter in regards to some clinical placements. There was a SickKids placement in 4th year and they only accepted the top 7 who applied, which was based on your GPA. As well, for your consolidation, there are specialty placements (ICU, NICU, Labour and Delivery, Emergency, etc) that you have to apply for through your program coordinator. This is also dependent on your GPA, a cover letter, and resume. 2) I didn't find bridging too difficult, but it was quite a bit of work. If anything, bridging was probably the easiest semester for myself. If you decide to do Humber's bridging and advance into 3rd year, my biggest advice is to do your readings and make your own notes. I did no readings in PN and did well by just attending lectures and using the provided slides. This doesn't work for this program because they don't teach you everything in lecture and the powerpoints have almost no information on them. Most of the info that you need for tests and such are in your readings. They'll provide you with weekly objectives (and they're loooong), so answer these objectives in detail and get them done on time, or you will fall behind (I spent endless nights catching up for falling behind). 3) As with other schools, there are some professors who are great and some that are not as helpful. I definitely did a lot of self-teaching (by a lot, I mean almost completely after bridging), but they are there if you have questions to ask. Humber actually has a great student help centre for writing essays and math (for the Statsitics course during bridging). I found that I had more help from the professors I had for bridging than when I entered into third year. 4) I found the breakdown of courses during bridging helpful, as I was also working almost full-time during. After that, I quit my job and just focused on school full-time. I had friends who worked a lot during school and still graduated with fantastic marks, so it is definitely possible. I found some bridging courses harder than others (Stats was super easy for me, but the transitions course was a little more challenging). Honestly, bridging was the easiest semester for me. Yes, having to maintain a 74% was definitely stressful. Keep in mind that it is 74% in every single bridging course, not the total average, in order to move on. If you have even a 73% for a single course, but an 80%+ in others, you fail the single course and will have to wait a year before attempting it again. I think this is what was most stressful for me, but if you make some friends, study together, ask for help when you need it, it is 100% manageable, even while working. 5) When you pass bridging and enter 3rd year, you'll first have a community placement. These can be schools, prisons, community centres, etc. This placement is basically you work in your clinical group to assess the needs of the community and plan, implement, and evaluate a project that will address the need. After this placement, it's all acute care for 2 semesters, which are hospitals. It is completely random, as they use HSPnet, which is a computerized system designed to place as many students into their top choices as much as possible. They don't really take into consideration your grades or where you live (except if you're manually applying to the speciality placements that I mentioned earlier). You choose 8-10 placements (depending on the semester and how many they want) and rank them. I've always gotten at least within the 10 placements that I ranked; however, a random few don't get their top 10 choices (which is rare). There are a ton of people who get their first choices, but I'm always the unlucky one and always get the bottom of my 10 choices unfortunately. I have friends who are always lucky and get their first choice (even though my GPA was a lot higher than theirs). I definitely learned more during placements, as we don't have as much time in lab. For each acute care placement, we had about 168 hours of placement, and 12ish hours of lab. They have open access labs during specific times where you can go in and practice your skills if you want to. For consolidation, if you're not doing a specialty placement, then you would need to do HSPnet, and for that, you have to choose about 2 LTC or community placements AT THE MINIMUM, and the rest can be hospitals if you want (you choose 15 choices). My year, there were a lot of LTC choices, so my best advice here is to maintain a good GPA and apply for the specialty, if you want a hospital. If not, stick with HSPnet and you're guaranteed the LTC of your choice. 6. I definitely do not regret getting my RN. When I graduated as a RPN, I didn't know what field of nursing I wanted to go into, possibly emergency or cardiology. It was through the RN program that I learned I wanted to do pediatrics and maternity. Bridging and becoming an RN opened a lot more doors for me and I built amazing friendships that I wouldn't trade for anything. Let me know if you have any more questions!

I know this is a super late reply, but to answer your question, you would need to maintain at least a 74% in all of your bridging courses (there are 6 of them) in order to move onto the 3rd year with the rest of the students. After you pass bridging, you would just need to maintain a 60% in your core nursing courses until you graduate. Humber is pretty set on when you would do your courses, there aren't any same course offerings in the fall and Winter semester for the nursing courses. If you fail one or decide not to take one, you would need to wait a whole year to take it, as that is the next offering for a course. I did my bridging through Humber and just graduated this past May, so feel free to ask any questions!