pie_face

Hi, i'm in a similar position, silly as it sounds have a look at the distance learning courses from the university of dundee, although based in the uk the it is recognised by ancc and nlnac, they do both bachelors and masters.

What a comprehensive and informative post, and I bow to your superior skills in searching the internet, I wonder if you would be able to post the details of the Work and Holiday visa (subclass 462). Could this be the visa Tyler's recruiter was refering to? I would be grateful to you for teaching me this. Whilst you are at it, could you also teach me some of the benefits and drawbacks of the 457, and the PR visas, with particular emphasis on nurses from the US who wish to work and travel in Australia for about a year. Finally and purely out of curiosity where in Australia did you work and on which particular visa? Your final statement on learning to use the internet instead of relying on the experience of others truly displays your intellectual prowess, I prostrate myself before you:bow:

I think you might be worrying too much about the reference issue, as long as you get two people, if you're a very recent grad it could be a tutor or clinical supervisor, and your current employer, you should have no problems. Think of it this way, if you have an aussie registration, have been succesful at interview and offered a post, passed your police checks and medical for your visa, do you think it likely that your potential employer will revoke the offer of a job because the reference is not on headed notepaper?

Your recruiter does know what they are talking about, if you are under 30 you can get a working tourist visa, which is valid for a year, if you are over 30 you can only work if sponsored or a permanent resident, or citizen.

Brisie has a river (complete with bull sharks) no beach, if you work at sydney childrens you will be a 15 min walk from coogee beach, there is a nice coastal walk from coogee to bondi beach covering some lovely smaller beaches, you can also stay in the hospital accomodation. It costs about $50 a week and is great for meeting people, but it is a little grotty, but what do you expect for $50!

As long as you have registration in oz, and can scrape together a couple of professional references you should have little trouble finding a job, either with an agency or directly through a hospital. I walk past the vacancy board every day on my way to work, there are always pages and pages of jobs.

Sorry you failed, but you obviously have the ability to pass, all the advice given is good, I just wanted to share what worked for me, beg or borrow as many cd-roms as you can get your hands on, regularly do a test of 75 questions, review your results and work on the weaker areas, it's good test practice and often gets you to look at subjects in a different way than if you just read them off a page, anyway keep your chin up, and good luck for next time.

As previously stated I am relaying information gained from colleagues and students I have worked with over the past three years, the most common grumble is too much time in school not enough time in practice. If you disagree then I'm happy for you, but I think you must conceed that not everyone will share your wholey postive experience, and I think it wrong to imply that an Aus bn is a good preparation for practice in the US when you both, in differant ways have said it's not. The point of this post is not to comment on the quality of the training but on it's ease of transition to the US, should the original poster find himself heading home after training, or part way through if he splits from his girlfriend. As such I stand by my original post.

I believe the student in question had stayed on to do honours thus I included the extra year. However it is also possible to do a masters in two years and gain registration, if you already have a first degree. So not all courses are three years. I'm not sure I understand the distinction between practicum and in house clinical blocks, are they both compulsory and a requirement for graduation? The figure of nine weeks came from a colleague I think from WA. It must be a cultural thing, I trained in a country where the training was split 50/50, our final three placements were 16 weeks each, so even your 20 weeks seem 'light' to my narrow mind. By the way I am not suggesting any lack in quality of the home made staff I have worked with here in Oz, however as has been pointed out there are a lot of nurse shortages and this makes giving students a quality experience during their short placements difficult. It also can make it difficult for new grads to get jobs due to lack of experienced mentors, this was widely reported only recently with a large number of new grads being unemployed. It sometimes seems to me as a relativley new arrival that the nurses here are excellent in spite of, not because of the 'system'.

shhh not too loud the japs might hear, might be a bit harder to harpoon than a mother and baby though

Mate if there is any possible way to study in the US then do it, your tuition fees here will be $30,000+, then everything else on top, and honestly you may find that the training is better at home, the average Aus nursing student gets very limited clinical practice, I've worked with students getting 9 weeks total in four years, not very good at all! Also it has to be said, all the guys from the US that I have worked with out here have all gone home again, that has to tell you something!

Some areas in POW offer 12 hour shifts, but none of the surgical wards do (to my knowledge), you could always do agency work, as opposed to working permanently for an agency, if you catch my drift, you may pick up a few 12h shifts a week especially if you can do icu. It's a different system out here and in many ways less flexible and progressive than your used to at home, in my experience very few places offer flexible working etc, if you are only interested in surg wards you will most likely be working 9 hour shifts.

Find the hospital you wish to work in and contact them direct, they will, more than likely be over the moon to hear from you, and bend over backwards to find you the job you want. They will be as practiced in organising visas as any agency, and you will have the confidence of knowing exactly where you will be working. In short there is absolutely no reason to go with an agency at all, and certainly not one that is not giving you what you want! The nurses in Melb have just been on strike due to pay and conditions, and there is a nationwide shortage of nurses. You have a clear idea of where you want to work DO NOT SETTLE FOR ANYTHING LESS. Melbourne's a nice town I'm sure you will have agreat time:yeah:

In my case the cvs was released to NY in june, I recieved my eligibility to test in august, registered for nclex, and am still waiting for my att. I initially sent my application to NY/CGFNS in october '06, so pushing 15 months and still not taken nclex, and will not find an employer to petition me even if I pass, so will have to endorse to another state anyway. In short international nurses heed my advice, steer well clear of NY. What was I thinking!!!!!:imdbb:

I wish they would scrap it, I have to wait four months to do it in sydney, and although they do'nt 'charge' you for it I don't think it's a coincidence that the application fee doubled at the same time the test came in.