singas0ng

Lilia! Thank you. NYP is definitely hiring and persistence is key. I applied ten times over the course of 4 months and got rejected 9 times before they finally contacted me for a possible interview. I requested medical-surgical but said I would prefer oncology if possible and I was told that several units were hiring for oncology. I did not do an externship but did have patient care associate experience from one summer which they did like. They do require a GPA greater than 3.0 and if you have any volunteer experience, add that as HR seemed to really like it. They also allow you to use volunteer experience under work history when filling out the apps. My tip for you is to apply early while you're still in school to get a head start. If you wait until you graduate, spots are already filled. I also advise you to drop by their employment services to look through their binder full of job listings. It offers much more information on positions that are willing to hire new grads than online positions did although you should still apply online. Call them and keep bothering them! Other than that! Make sure your resume is perfect :] and be persistent! You can pm me if you have any other questions. Hope this helps!

Hi.. Just to infuse a little bit of hope but I finally was hired at New York Presbyterian after a six month long job search. During this job market, I think it's important to get very creative. I never though about how much work was required in job searching. Handing in a resume online never worked but nonetheless I consistently searched the hospitals every day and got rejected all the time. I had no interviews. I would advise hitting up job fairs. I have gotten two call backs for an interview through a job fair. The one tip I can give is that everything happens a lot less quicker than you would want to. I didn't get a call for an interview from the nursing job fair until over a month later! And talk to any nurses that you may know to help you with the search. Connections are key right now and polish up your resume and personalize your cover letter and get good recommendation/reference letters. Don't give them a reason not to hire you because of little things.

I didn't interview at NYU but I can tell you about my interview experience at another New York Hospital. It was a two part process where I was interviewed by the HR first and then interviewed by the Nurse Manager. All in all, the interview process is similar to any other interview process. The best way to prepare is to do mock interviews so that you are prepped for whatever questions that comes your way! For example, they asked about my strengths and weaknesses. They asked about how I dealt with difficult coworkers (display teamwork here) or difficult patient and family. They will almost 100% ask you why you want to work for NYU (Make sure to research the background and mission statement of NYU) and why you want to work with the patient population that you want to work with. The best tip I got for these is to come up with very specific clinical or non clinical experience that you can relate. One question that I really liked and asked the nurse manager was to ask her what specific challenges I might face as a new graduate nurse on the unit. http://erddig.typepad.com/nurse_blog/2006/07/common_intervie.html This list covers good amount so just look through it and make sure you are able to come up with a response. Good luck! Take a deep breath.

Just to throw in my 2 cents! I took it and passed :] With a limited amount of time, the best form of studying was to buy Mosby's Pharmacology flip book that utilizes pictures and mnemonics in order to help you cover the basic medications. It does a pretty good job of covering the bases and honestly if you are able to remember the category of drugs and knowing how to recognize the meds in the category will help you differentiate between the meds. It's important to know the side effects of the drug and exactly what they're used for. And get your calculations down pat! Because it would really suck to lose points on something that you definitely could get 100 in. Another thing I didn't know is that it's 70 questions, but only 60 counted and so overall, it made me feel better cause it felt like I had a better chance. The nurse recruiter did tell me that new grads tend to do better on this exam because they have a general knowledge of medications and studying for the NCLEX gives you a fresh memory for not just the medications, but the overall body system which allows you to make good educated guesses. And just take loads of practice questions but don't go crazy. Its not as easy as you would want it to be, but it's still manageable with even just one week of hard studying! If anybody has any questions, just PM me please.

I think meeting racist patients is an unavoidable aspect of life. Its something I encounter in an everyday situation, like just walking into a deli and having people pretend they know how to speak Chinese. (I'm not Chinese.) As a nursing student in Boston, I have encountered few nurses themselves are not great about treating everyone with equal respect. I have seen some nurses not attempt to get translators for patients who do not speak English and they spent less time with the patient themselves. I understand that language barrier is always hard but having been on the other side before where I was treated differently because of the way I look, I tend to empathize with those patients. It's also evident in how some nurses treated me as a student nurse. Often times, I'm ignored or not directly spoken to, whereas my fellow student nurses (who are white) are treated differently. I think if it had happened once, it would have been easy to dismiss it as a singular event that was unrelated to what I looked like, but it's something I picked up on continuously over my nursing clinical experience. This was also noted by some of the other Asian nursing student. Or, I remember one nursing instructor who always switched my name with another Asian nursing student all the way until the end of the semester. (We look nothing alike, different height, different haircut) While I don't believe that these nurses are racists who "hate" Asians or people who look different from them, it seemed as if they didn't know how to approach different people. But there is a definite flip-side to this story. I am very conscious about providing culturally competent care and I always try to treat everyone with the same respect they deserve as human beings and it's something that I appreciate and am glad I can bring to a clinical setting.

Hi I felt the same about about the job fair. I thought it was a waste of my time because it seemed like none of the nurse recruiters would ever remember me. But this past week, I heard back from two of the places that I applied to to come in for an interview! So I think despite it seeming like it wasn't worth it, it really did more for me than 6 months of online applying did.

oops, sorry for the double reply, thought the first one didn't go through!

Definitely try to do an externship as it gives you the opportunity to be hired within the hospital and give you a step up as a candidate in other hospital. Also choose your synthesis placement (also know as preceptorship) on a unit and hospital you want to work at as a lot of girls in my program got their job through their placement. Good luck! It's great you're starting to think about this already.

Definitely consider doing an externship porgram as it gives you a step up from other candidates to get hired. Also, choose your synthesis clinical placement (also known as a preceptorship) at a unit and hospital you might want to work at. A lot of girls in my program got their jobs through that.

I definitely feel the same way! I've been told that no matter what, the first year is always hard. Just stick it out and in the end it'll really pay off. Good luck!

I am in the same predicament as you! Let me know if anything does help. I feel just as nervous as it's been 6 months since I've been in school too. Good luck!

Hi I graduated Dec 2008, took my boards in February and was offered a job at the end of May.

It was the pharmacology reviews and rationales by prentice hall nursing 2nd edition.

I am completely aware that this thread has been started before but I noticed that a lot of them are old and NY Presbyterian has changed the format since and I notice that there have not been a lot of responses answering the questions. Now, they don't give you a medication sheet to study from but recommend a 700 page book!! I was given 5 days to study for the exam and am in desperate need for some more guidance as it's going to be impossible for me to review the whole book in time without a little bit of an idea on what to focus on, what to skip over. I am pretty solid with calculations and am not worried about that but I am curious about how specific the drugs they question you on is? Is it basic side-effects that they ask a lot on? How about the contraindications? I do know the basic ones that I studied for with the NCLEX but it still worries me because pharmacology was my weakest point when taking my NCLEX. Please any tips would be helpful!

Hi everyone, I'm kind of in the same predicament. I was hired on Thursday and given until this Wednesday to study for the pharmacology book. I got the book yesterday but it is a lot of material. If anyone can give me any sort of guidance, I definitely would appreciate it! They are rushing me so that I can start in a week and a half and I definitely feel the pressure. How specific should I go when I study? Was there a topic they tend to be heavy on? ANY ADVICE!

Well, there are still some hospitals in the area that are hiring such as New York Presbyterian. The best thing you can do right now knowing how the economy is, is to make yourself stand out from the crowd. If you can do externship or a patient care associate job while attending school, hospitals tend to really like that. It also helps you in acquiring a job in that hospital as hospitals like Memorial Sloan Kettering seems to hire first within their externship program nursing students. Its a difficult market, but I honestly feel that it's just as hard in other fields. Stick with it, and hopefully in 2 years it'll turn around and by being proactive and prepping yourself before you graduate, you can definitely find a job! Good LUCK

Yes. I should be thinking positively! Thank you for the encouragement!!

ahhh that doesn't sound too promising i hope that isn't the case for me too! thank you for sharing though :)

okay! So I got an email from human resources at new york presbyterian, first asking me about what unit I want to work at, why I want to work at NYP, what shifts I wanted to work at etc. Then, the HR lady called a week to follow up and let me know they did have oncology shifts open for nights and to expect another phone call the next week. Another HR guy calls and asks similar questions about why I want to work at NYP etc etc... and then says he has to see if any of the oncology units have room to hire new grads as they have to keep their ratio of experienced nurses to new grad nurses... basically, this call didn't sound so promising as now it seems like they're telling me that they have to see if they even have a position for me... He also tells me the process is to interview with HR then with manager. Is it normal for things to take this long to arrange an interview? And now I'm paranoid about whether or not I'll even have a chance at an interview because the last phone call made it seem like there's a good chance there won't be positions either... I think this is just me expressing my confusion here as this is my first call back in 4 months of job searching and I really really want this to work out! Any helpful advice would be appreciate!!

HI everyone, I just wanted to pick people's brains about a question I had. I am a recent December graduate from the Boston area and have passed my NCLEX in the state of Massachusetts. Because the job market for new graduate has been so difficult in Boston areas, I have begun to apply in the New York and New Jersey area where I am originally from as my family are still there. I have had no luck so far with job openings but I was wondering if it may be because my license is for Mass and not New York or New Jersey. Would it help my chances of getting hired if I transfered my license to the other states before applying for a job? Hope someone can help me out! Thanks!!