Chronis

Well I called them and was told that no one has dropped yet and no alternates have been selected. There are apparently 24 people on the alternate list so it doesn't look good for people on the alternate list.

Well it's been a couple of years now since I went there and I know a few things have changed. That being said when I went it was your GPA in select courses mostly in the sciences that mattered whether you where selected in the program. Taking a quick glance at Orvis website confirmed that this is still the case. Also I believe Orvis has started interviews being required now which it didn't before. So first I would calculate what your GPA is regarding Orvis school of nursing specifically, and what your nursing GPA would be if you got A's in your 5 remaining courses. That being said and I don't want to be mean here or anything here but back when I applied if your pre nursing GPA is 3.3 when you applied to the program you wouldn't have had a chance in getting into Orvis or WNC or TMCC for that matter. However I believe these schools have started admitting more students so you might have better chances now. Also the Apollo nursing school which is a for profit school would probably definitely be a possibility for you. You also might want to consider retaking those courses which you didn't get A's in that count towards your Nursing GPA. That being said if you truly want to be a nurse and are willing to relocate or to retake certain classes I am sure you can get into nursing school somewhere. I should warn you however the really hard part comes after you graduate when your trying to get a job. The California Institute for Nursing and Healthcare has had a survey revealing 46% of new new nurses not finding jobs after 18 months.

Well if you look at the study the RAND corporation did a few years back it does indicate that there will be a surplus of CRNA's by 2020. That being said in the field of nursing CRNA's are going to be the most in demand due to it's selective and restrictive entry requirements into the profession. Entry level nursing already has a massive surplus with new nurses struggling to get jobs. A separate study has also been done by the RAND corporation regarding NP's and they are facing a huge surplus by 2020. So while it is true in the future it may be difficult to get jobs as a CRNA it's going to be much more difficult for all other careers in nursing. I have posted the link to the study below: http://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/technical_reports/2010/RAND_TR688.pdf

Hi tgibs87: I can't really compare RNs to radiation therapy since I am not that familiar about the pay and job opportunities in radiation therapy. However I can say that the job market for new RNs is pretty abysmal right now so you might want to keep that in mind. However I have taken both microbiology and two semesters of physics. One thing you should look into is if the physics required for radiation therapy is a technical, intro, or health science physics class. Those types of physics courses are significantly easier than college level physic courses that one would need to take for things like medical school. I took two semesters of college physics courses and from my own personal experience I can tell you that I found microbiology to be much easier and the labs far more interesting. However the two are quite different with microbiology being much more memory based while physics as you can imagine was extremely math intensive. I will say though that I am surprised that if you got through human anatomy and physiology that you wouldn't be able to get through microbiology. All of those courses I thought where pretty much the same in terms of difficulty. Are you having problems with the micro lab, or do you find the class boring? Perhaps you just have a bad teacher. Have you tried taking microbiology with another professor? One suggestion I have that may help you make sense of a class you are struggling with is to look for a book like microbiology for dummies. This may seem a little silly I know but when I was in calculus I found the book the professor assigned to us to be absolutely no help whatsoever. If I had relied upon that useless 12 pound book I would have definitely either failed calculus or done very poorly. My calculus professors lectures also sucked and I learned absolutely nothing about calculus when I attended them. The only way I made it through that course was by taking my calculus for dummies book and using it to literally teach myself calculus. I also would encourage you to examine your own study habits and try to see how they might be improved. I know when I first started taking the science courses my study skills where really lousy. When I took general chemistry for the first time I got a D+ and in my first semester of human anatomy and physiology I got a C+. I would latter go on to retake both those courses and get A's in both so it can be done. In any event I wish you the best of luck whatever future career path you choose.

Hi Alana, I have just completed UNRs RN-BSN program. To tell you the truth I was not impressed. While some of the instructors where great others where absolutely terrible. Honestly if I had to do it over again I would definitely go somewhere else.

Dishes, I am an ADN nurse who is currently in school getting my BSN. I am also heavily into science and research and am always willing to keep an open mind regarding these matters. However there are currently numerous studies stating that there is a relationship between lower mortality rates and a baccalaureate degree in nursing. Combined these studies examined hundreds of hospitals, tens of thousands of nurses and hundreds of thousands of patients. These studies as you can imagine are very compelling. I also read your link about research that you posted. From what I gathered the study of an RN/RPN toolkit focused on designing a guide that would determine appropriate RN/RPN staffing ratios based on patients level of acuity. What I didn't see in this study was a comparison between an all RN work force and a RN/RPN workforce. Again this study seemed to be focused primarily on staffing. This study seems to be designed for setting appropriate staffing mix ratios of an RN/RPN workforce. This study was pretty hard to follow though and it's getting late so I'm pretty tired. So if you think I made a mistake regarding this research please let me know and I will review it again after I have gotten some more sleep.

Nursel56 I think the Institute of Medicines report calling for 80% of all nurses to have their BSN by 2020 was pretty definitive. However I will include excerpts of the report below that further demonstrate the reports support for BSN education. "A growing body of research documents that hospitals with a larger proportion of bedside care nurses with BSNs or higher qualifications is associated with lower risk of patient mortality." "Advances in medical science and technology, the changing practice boundaries between medicine and nursing, and the increase in the share of the population with multiple chronic health conditions create a level of complexity in health care that requires a more educated health care workforce. Nursing is the least well educated health profession by far but the one experiencing the greatest expansion in scope of practice and responsibilities." I'm going to post a link to the Institute of Medicines report below so everyone can read it for themselves and come to their own conclusions. By the way nursel56 do you know the page in the report where you got your quote from? I looked for it but was unable to find it. My quotes are from page 485 of the report. The Future of Nursing: Leading Change, Advancing Health Nursel56 you can look for a certain result in science, it's called a hypothesis. However what you cannot do is disregard data that doesn't support your hypothesis. Researchers propose hypotheses as explanations of phenomena, and design studies to test these hypotheses. Nursel56, Nursel56 I took a look at your link. As a very intelligent individual you know that the American Association of Community Colleges (AACC) would be very biased regarding this matter. Also since the AACC first sent out this message back in 2003 it has had plenty of time to do its own research to dispute these studies but has not done so. In addition since the AACC's 2003 statement there have been numerous different studies that researchers have done regarding the relationship between lower patient mortality rates and BSN nurses. These studies have come to the exact same conclusions as the 2003 study that the AACC attacked. Here is another excerpt from the Institute of Medicines report which I think helps illustrate this concept: "Aiken and colleagues (2003) in a paper published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) showed that in 1999, each 10 percent increase in the proportion of a hospital's bedside nurse workforce with BSN qualification was associated with a 5 percent decline in mortality following common surgical procedures. A similar finding was published by Friese and associates for cancer surgical outcomes (Friese et al., 2008). Aiken's team has replicated this finding in a larger study of hospitals in 2006. Similar results have been published for medical as well as surgical patients in at least three large studies in Canada and Belgium (Estabrooks et al., 2005; Tourangeau et al., 2007; Van den Heede et al., 2009)."

By admitting there is a correlation you are admitting that there is a relationship between lower mortality rates and a baccalaureate degree in nursing. However you appear to be arguing that because the studies don’t show causation they are irrelevant. That is not the case. I brought up the smoking argument because it was relevant to this discussion. We didn’t prove causation when it came to the fact that smoking caused cancer. Instead we proved that smoking caused cancer by endlessly repeating findings showing an association between smoking an cancer. Therefore I believe you are in err regarding the argument that we cannot state that training in BSN programs helps reduce patient mortality. By endlessly repeating findings that show an association between lower mortality rates and a baccalaureate degree in nursing we can prove it and state it. As for the questions on the variables I was just asking you what variables you think could lead to a correlation but not causation.

futurernmena, i am sorry to hear about your boss. in response to your question to the best of my knowledge the current research would count adn nurses who complete their bsns as bsn nurses because that’s what they would be. i don’t see how that would affect any of the data in the studies however. dishes, do you know what those studies are called regarding the use of rn/rpn vs. rn? or what journal article they where published in? i would be skeptical to take anything employers said on faith. in my experience at least in america employers are more worried about saving money that protecting patient’s health. nursel56, that’s the same argument the tobacco companies used when they where trying to dispute the studies that showed smoking caused cancer. however if you have any ideas on unknown variables that might have effected all the studies i would be glad to hear them. gitanorn, topics regarding a new york rn-bsn bill have probably been discussed several times throughout the years. that’s because new york has proposed similar bills to a01977 requiring rns to go on and get their bsns for the last 8 years ryan, i certainly agree with you that cattiness in nursing must stop. horizontal violence in nursing is mean spirited and unprofessional. the issue of rn-bsn should not be used to attack individual nurses. however if the current studies do indicate that the training in bsn programs helps reduce patient mortality shouldn’t we take a hard look at implementing such training in our workforce? don’t we have a duty as health care professionals to give the best care possible to the general public?

Dishes I was able to find the whole article that you mentioned in your link: http://www.jblearning.com/samples/0763744379/Hall.pdf The study you mentioned does not refute the BSN only staffing models. It only states that a higher proportion of professional nursing staff (which this study defines as RNs and RPNs) in the staff mix have better outcomes than nursing staff mix’s that include unregulated staff (URW) and a lower proportion of professional nursing staff. RPNs in this case refer to registered practical nurses which in Canada have roughly the same practice rights as LPNs here. “Specifically, staff mix models that included a lower proportion of professional nursing staff (RNs and RPNs) were related to the use of more nursing hours (t = -2.09; P = .05). The fewer RNs and RPNs employed on the unit, the fewer hours of nursing care used. In contrast, the higher the proportion of unregulated staff on the unit, the greater the nursing hours costs.” No where in this study did I see it state how the (RN/RPN) nursing staff model performed in relation to the all-RN nursing staff model. However if you think I missed something you think is particularly relevant which will show me to be in error feel free to point it out and I will look over the study again.

Well ADN's would still have the same rights to practice as they always have but would need to obtain their BSN in 10 years. According to the bill any licensed ADN nurse who doesn’t obtain a baccalaureate degree in the required time would face disciplinary action including but not limited to the loss of their registered nursing license.

I was curious what everyone thinks about the debate over the law being proposed in New York which seeks to require all registered professional nurses to attain a baccalaureate degree in nursing within ten years of their initial licensure? http://www.advisory.com/Daily-Briefing/2012/01/04/BSN-in-10 The New York bill A01977 wouldn't apply to registered professional nurses who are already licensed in the state of New York. Also those currently in school to become registered professional nurses in the state of New York would also be grandfathered in and exempt from the new legislation. I have looked into research regarding this topic and the research I have seen seems to support the fact that nurses educated at the baccalaureate degree have lower mortality rates for patients. One study indicates that increasing nurse's educational level decreases the risk of patient death and failure to rescue by four percent (Aiken et al., 2008). Also hospitals with a higher proportion of baccalaureate-prepared nurses have a lower mortality rate (Friese et al., 2008). In fact the Institute of Medicine has issued a call for 80% of registered nurses to possess a baccalaureate degree or higher by 2020 (Institute of Medicine, 2011). Other research I found supports the fact that BSN nurses are associated with lower mortality rates. I have included this research below: Estabrooks, C. A., Midodzi, W. K., Cummings, G. G., Ricker, K. L., & Giovannetti, P. (2005). The impact of hospital nursing characteristics on 30-day mortality. Nursing Research, 54(2), 74-84. Tourangeau, A. E., Doran, D. M., Hall, L. M., Pallas, L. O. B., Pringle, D., Tu, K. V., et al. (2006). Impact of hospital nursing care on 30-day mortality for acute medical patients. Journal of Advanced Nursing, 57(1), 32-44. To be fair I tried locating research that would cast doubt on the research above or that would come to a different conclusion. I was however unsuccessful in locating any such research. If anyone has any additional research that would repudiate the fact that nurses prepared at the bachelor's level seem to have a lower rate of mortality for their patients could you please post it? I would love to see such a study and would be very interested in reading it. References Aiken, L.H., Clarke, S.P., Sloane, D.M., Lake, E.T. & Cheney, T. (2008). Effects of hospital care environment on patient mortality and nurse outcomes. Journal of Nursing Administration, 38(5), 223-229. Friese, C.R, Lake, E.T., Aiken, L.H., Silber, J.H. & Sochalski, J. (2008). Hospital nurse practice environments and outcomes for surgical oncology patients. Health Services Research, 43(4), 1145-1163. Institute of Medicine. (2011). The Future of Nursing: Leading Change, Advancing Health. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press.

Scir If you want to be a CRNA aren't you going to need your bachelors? In any case I went to WNC and personally didn't know anyone who had a 4.0 GPA. Counting just my pre-nursing classes I had about a 3.91 GPA before I started nursing school. While in nursing school I averaged about a 3.3 GPA. I definitely don't think WNC would be the right place to go to get a 4.0. However I don't think TMCC and UNR are going to be places where you can get easy A's either. All 3 of these nursing schools are extraordinarily competitive to get into. Once you get accepted into one of these nursing schools you're basically competing with all the other super high GPA students. That makes it very difficult to maintain your GPA. But if you absolutely have to get A's I would say your best shot is Carrington College. Many of the students who go to Carrington where rejected from the other schools because they had lower GPA's. So at Carrington you're not competing against all the other 4.0 GPA students. Hoped this info helped you out. Good luck!

Actually at least when it comes to nursing men are almost twice as likely to leave the profession as females according to this study done by the University of Pennsylvania. "7.5 percent of new male nurses dropped out of nursing within four years of graduating from nursing school, compared to 4 percent of women" http://www.upenn.edu/researchatpenn/article.php?435&hlt

MrsEd are you already and RN and are you referring to the RN to BSN program? If so then yes I am also applying to that program for this fall. What I have heard is that they are getting more and more applicants each year and it's becoming a competitive process. I was told that they are first going to take the applicants who have ever last prerequisite class done (Not counting the classes they waive by petition like nutrition). Once they have narrowed the selection down to those who have all their prerequisites done and if there are more applicants then spaces they will then rank people by there DARS Nursing GPA to decide who gets into the program. I heard they never have actually had to rank people by their gpa but due to the increase in applicants they might have to this year. Your DARS nursing GPA should have been at the bottom of your application when you applied. If you don't remember what your DARS nursing GPA is you can look it up via epaws. If you are not a RN already and are applying to go into the BSN program directly unfortunately I don't know that much about it. Here is a link some one posted before talking a little about it: https://allnurses.com/nv-nursing-programs/unr-spring-2011-a-509369.html. I believe that applicants to the direct BSN program also are admitted by ranking the applicants by their DARS nursing gpa but it's a tiny bit different from the RN to BSN one so be careful you don't get the two confused. In any case if you have any questions feel free to ask though I can't guarantee I will have all the answers. Anyway hopefully this info was helpful. Good Luck!

Well last I heard WNC was going to alternate between having 40 and 48 students accepted each year. The extra 8 openings every other year would be reserved for the students from Fallen. However if you are from Fallen and they are not offering the extra 8 slots this year you could still apply to the normal program. My information might be out of date however since I graduated from there in May, 2010. WNC only offer's fall admission for the nursing program so I wouldn't worry too much about them not offering a fall 2011 class. In any case even if they didn't offer a fall 2011 class or if you don't get accepted you could still try applying to TMCC. WNC's nursing program was insanely competitive when I got accepted there and I hear it's even worse now. Anyway I hope it all works out for you and good luck!

Well I am not sure if I would consider myself an economic buff but I have researched this a bit on my own. The short answer to your question about when the nursing shortage will return is that it depends. There is currently conflicting data out there. The most popular study is done by Peter Buerhaus. This also seems to be the one that is the most widely accepted among nursing academics. The study is "The Recent Surge in Nurse Employment: Causes and Implications," published in the July/August 2009 edition of Health Affairs. http://content.healthaffairs.org/cgi/content/abstract/28/4/w657 "Because registered nurses over age 50 will soon be the largest age group in the nursing workforce, their retirement over the next decade will lead to a projected shortfall developing by 2018 and growing to approximately 260,000 registered nurses by 2025." http://www.mc.vanderbilt.edu/news/releases.php?release=901 Peter Buerhaus has also commented that "In the near-term (next couple of years) we can expect that, until there is a strong jobs recovery, most hospitals and other employers will continue to find that they can employ all the RNs they want at prevailing wages." http://www.aacn.nche.edu/media/newsreleases/2010/tricouncil.html Another study done by Economic Modeling Specialist Inc. which isn't nearly as well known states that: "In every state but Alaska and Nevada, there's projected to be an excess of registered nurses in each of the next five years. In some of the most heavily populated states-Florida, Pennsylvania, New York-the oversupply is especially noticeable. Pennsylvania, for example, is projected to need just over 4,000 nurses each year in our projection. Yet it produced 10,549 RNs in 2008-09." http://www.economicmodeling.com/2010/06/11/comparing-the-output-of-nurses-with-estimated-demand/ "In 2008-09, the difference between the number of new nurses that graduated nationally and the number of estimated open nursing positions was nearly 86,000-that's 86,000 more nursing grads than nursing jobs." http://www.economicmodeling.com/2010/06/11/comparing-the-output-of-nurses-with-estimated-demand/ Now the Economic Modeling Specialist study has been attacked by the Tri-Council for Nursing which you can read here: http://www.aacn.nche.edu/media/newsreleases/2010/tricouncil.html You can also read Economic Modeling Specialist Inc. defense of their study here: http://www.economicmodeling.com/2010/06/25/digging-deeper-into-data-on-registered-nurses/ You can also read the latest National Student Nursing Associations survey about job placement for new nurses. This currently shows no improvement in 2010 job placement for new grads from the numbers collected in 2009. "Statistics for 2010 show no change in the number of employed/unemployed new graduates." "When asked if they have an RN position, 54% said "yes" and 46% responded "no." By program type, the data revealed that 59% of the baccalaureate graduates, 51% of the associate degree graduates, 43% of accelerated BSN graduates, and 51% of the diploma graduates were employed as registered nurses." http://www.ajj.com/services/publishing/deansnotes/sep10.pdf So in Summary: Best Case Scenario: Shortage returns in 2018. Worst Case Scenario: We are currently producing far more nurses than we actually need which if the trend continues indicates there will be no nursing shortage.

Okay some new info. Apparently what the Renown recruiter told us about hiring locally isn't true. For instance I heard they hired a new grad from Sacramento into the CIC when I and multiple other candidates got rejected from that position. Also Renown set up a booth at the National Student Nurses Association convention and said they where actively recruiting new grads from out of state. Apparently local graduates are not given preference when being hired at Renown. So I just wanted to correct the information I had written earlier and not discourage anyone from applying.

Well I'm from Northern Nevada so I'm not sure about Southern Nevada but I heard that it is horrible for new grads. The other day a girl in my class who wants to move down there told me all the hospitals have big red postings online that say NO NEW GRADS. Unfortunately up here in Northern Nevada things seem to be getting worse and worse. Some hospitals and facilities are hiring a few new grads but you would likely need to know someone or have some connections to get those positions (Very Competitive). Renown hospital which is the biggest hospital in Northern Nevada is the only facility I have heard of that's actually hiring a decent amount of new grads. However Renown recruiters told us they are pretty much only hiring local new grads (and they weren't even sure they'd be able hire all of us). Apparently Renown has really gotten burned in the past when they hired new grads from out of state particularly California. This is because the out of sate new gads get their year of experience and then move back to California where they can make more money and be with their families. To make matters worse Apollo College has just moved into the area and is going to start graduating their classes next year which will effectively double the amount of new grads in Northern Nevada and flood the market making a bad situation worse. So in short it's a pretty lousy situation all around for new grads. I wish I had better news for you. I have heard rumors that Texas is hiring new grads but the pay is really low. Good luck with whatever you decide to do.

Well I am still in nursing school but from what I can tell from clinical the nurses at Carson Tahoe are very nice and friendly. The winters can get cold and you'll also have to get used to driving in snow. There's also not really a whole lot to do in Carson City unless you like gambling however you can drive up to Lake Tahoe which takes about 30 minutes. Lake Tahoe does have activities like skiing and snowboarding available. The community tends to be conservative republicans as is most of Nevada besides the Vegas area which tends to be more liberal. Carson City like most of Nevada is in a financial mess right now so you'll see lots of empty store fronts and unused office space. I wouldn't recommend living in Carson City if you have or are planning to have kids however because the schools with the exception of the college aren't very good. Eagle Valley middle school at the time I attended it was full of thugs and bullies and I can't imagine it has gotten much better. Also the High school is severely overcrowded with students. Hopefully this was helpful and good luck with whatever you decide to do.

WNC is a great program with a lot of great teachers. It's pretty tuff though and can be very stressful. If you want you could read a little more about it on the post Wnc. If you have any specific questions about WNC I will also do my best to answer them. It's great you got in your first choice though :nuke:! I've also heard that Apollo College is pretty ludicrously expensive. But if it's only two years like I've heard I guess people will graduate faster than if they went to either TMCC or WNC since it takes us 3 year's with our prerequisites.

Well first off congratulations:yeah:! I was accepted into WNC in 2008 not 2009 but seeing as no one has answered this question yet ill give it my best shot. While I did not apply to both schools I do know students who did. One student I know was rejected from TMCC but was put on the wait list and eventually accepted into WNC. I think both schools are fairly evenly competitive with one schools being a little more competitive than the other in a given year. This might change however with the new Apollo program opening in Reno as students will have more options available to them. This might lower the competition to get in to a given school though this is merely conjecture on my part. Congratulations again on your acceptance and good luck!

Oh one thing I forgot to mention is that WNC does not have a BSN program. I had heard there had been some discussions about about implementing it but that was before the economy took a dive.

i just finished my first semester at wnc and i can tell you it's by far the hardest thing ive ever done. the work load is intense and the teachers say about 26% of students don't make it to the second year. the teachers told us at orientation that they know where all a students but we would have to get us to getting c's. in fact our motto around hear is a c=rn. to answer your question it is very difficult to get into with about half of the applicants this year being rejected. the person who said 12 was the cut off must have applied a few years ago cause the lowest score that i know of that got in was a 14. the person who got that score was an alternate and said they wouldn't have gotten in originally but the school found some extra money so they got to go. so with a 15 you could probably get in but i would recommend having a 16 just to be safe. the program is offered once a year in the fall and in my class we had a total of 65 students originally. you can look on wnc's website to see the breakdown of the points scale http://www.wnc.edu/academics/degrees/aas/nur/criteria.php 18 is the maximum possible points. anyway hopefully this info was helpful. good luck!