Ashtae220

If you live in CT and you are looking for a job in a group home it shouldn't be too difficult (so long as you don't live on the side of CT near Rhode Island). I have always been able to find a job within 2 months. Some of the agencies in CT (these are all over) are Ability Beyond Disability, Institute of Professional Practice, CSI, RMI, Key Human Services, Oak Hill, all of the Arcs (arc of meriden, arc of litchfield, etc.), Dungarvin, Marrakech, Education Connection-- there are more those are the ones I remember off the top of my head. Not all of these are the best places to work, but they all do pay over 11 an hour. I hope that helps some of you guys!

I love being a 1:1 paraprofessional. It is so much better than working at group homes. I have also been lucky enough to have some great kids who I adore. Plus you can't beat the paid Christmas, Thanksgiving and April breaks and snow days. I would stay at my school without question but in June we will be losing 1/3 of our students. I work at district funded private school and we are struggling right now. I am a good employee. I frequently get achievement awards. But all the staff is good. I've only worked there two years. Most of my co-workers have worked there five years or more. So I doubt I will be kept. If you can get a paraprofessional job run with it. Many places pay only 10 an hour. Others only provide 19 hours a week. That's the biggest challenge with the field. Other places will pay you 15-19 an hour but are harder to get into. It's hard to know if you will be working with ED which can be challenging or LD which I think is much less stressful. I could go back to group homes. I am PMT, Handle With Care, First Aid, and CPR certified. I have previously worked for 3 different agencies. My Med. Cert is lapsed but I can easily pass the test again. But if I did I would be a job coach or work 3rd shift because it's safer. I don't have my bachelors yet but I am over 95 credits in for degree in human services.

Thank you for the advice, I live near Waterbury. There seems to be tons of CNA jobs available around here. Other people have told me 13-15 an hour is doable, but I want as much feedback as possible. I have worked in group homes before. The work isn't awful but I have found the people who work with me to be awful. I have seen a lot of abuse and a lot of abuse being covered up in this environment. Many people working who have no business working so I am wary of it. I make 1400 a month now only working 35 hours a week and don't want to downgrade from that to much so that's a big consideration.

I am considering getting my CNA. Right now I work at a school as a 1:1 aide. I love my job but there is a huge chance my contract won't be renewed in June due to reduced student enrollment. I work with a student who has a shunt and seizures and previously worked at group homes where we helped to bathe, toilet, passed medications, delivered wound care, worked with bedpans, spoiled linens, etc. I did not mind that work so I think I might not mind being a CNA. It is very hard to get a school job, especially one that doesn't require that you do holds so I thought CNA might be the better choice, especially since I am still going for my bachelor's and CNA might provide me more flexibility. However, I live in CT and would have to pay about 1000 for the training. I provide the majority of income for myself and my disabled husband, so I'd need to make at minimum 1420 monthly after taxes and my own health insurance. Is this possible because I don't want to invest money into a program and not be able to pay my bills? Also do you think I may be looking at CNA with rose colored glasses? Thanks for the help!

I am not sure if this is the best place to ask this, but I figured if anyone would know it would be the people on allnurses.com! I have an interview for a residential instructor position on Wednesday at a group home for disabled adults (between the ages of 18-29). I really want this job because I would like to work with disabled people specifically (my eventual goal isn't in nursing, but speech language pathology) and because I am still a college student and the shift they are hiring for is 2nd or 3rd which would allow me to still go to school when I need to. Anyway I'm really nervous about my interview! I have never really been in a group home environment. I'm trying to look up reviews of people who have worked in a group home before to figure out what it's like to work at one (I know what the job entails but I'm looking for something a bit deeper than that I guess). I also have no idea what to wear! When I go on interviews I usually wear a pant suit outfit with a jacket but I'm not sure if that would be appropriate. They are having me come in to meet the residents during my interview. I'm also worried about my car. Right now the muffler is broken. I'm getting it fixed as soon as I can, but I probably have to wait till January due to a lack of funds. My car is really loud and I don't want it to be super noticeable. It's also a bit of an old beater with somewhat peeling paint, rust spots and a few dents. I'm not sure if I would have to drive around in my car or not. They did require that people have a valid driver's license, but they didn't mention any job duties consisting of driving in our own vehicles, so I'm not sure if that requirement was simply so they know people can make it to work during the required shifts or not. Any tips at all would be really appreciated!

It's my personal opinion obviously, but I think that loan forgiveness is great for people working in the public sector. This law is not just for the benefit or nurses but for those who chose to go into a low paying careers (having worked in the non profit world I can say it's hard to even make ends meet at times) that provide the public assistance needed to help others. Even so far as nursing goes, I say, why shouldn't nurses who have dedicated atleast ten years of their lives working in a difficult field that benefits society as a whole get a break? Especially when you consider that the cost of an education is OVERLY inflated. I believe (I could be wrong on this) that the United States is only developed country that charges such outrageous tuition for furthering education. It's great if you can pay off your entire loan by yourself with no help whatsoever while also going to school at the same time. Unfortunately, you can't compare every single person to your own experiences. Not everyone has the same capacity as you to do things. I also came from a single parent family and through luck and connections my mother was able to get a job working with the state. She was the only person in my family to ever raise out of the lower class. The rest of my family is on welfare and disability. The government says I can afford to pay 7000 dollars a year when my mother can hardly afford to help me with 1000. My only choice then is loans or scholarships (both of which I have) but even so I expect that my debt upon graduation will be between 40-60k. With that being said I hope to have my loans paid off in less then ten years time so that I don't need to use a forgiveness program, but I would understand and be compassionate towards those who do choose to use such a program.

I recently realized that I would love to be a midwife one day and so I'm trying to apply into a Nursing program. I had a bad semester back in 2006 when I first went to college which ended up with me being put on academic suspension (it was pretty bad, I ended up having a 0.33 GPA). I was suffering from some depression issues. Since then I have done a 10 month national service program and gone to community college. I have been back to college for one semester now and I just got my grades back (I made the Dean's List and have a GPA of 3.55!) The associates program at my school takes applications in February (for Fall 10) and the requirements are an accumulative GPA of 2.7. I've done the math and I don't think I can possibly raise my GPA high enough in just one semester to get into the program. I'm trying to figure out if I should even bother applying. I want to get my Masters eventually and I was planning on doing an RN to BSN or Masters program so that I can work and go to school at the same time. Now I'm wondering if it would be better to transfer to my state college to get my BSN right off the bat (it doesn't make sense to me to wait until 2011 to even start getting my associates degree when in about the same amount of time I could have my BSN). I don't really know if I could get accepted into a BSN program at my state college (the site confuses me a bit). I would have to be at the state college for a year before getting accepted into the BSN program from what I can figure. I'm just trying to become a nurse as quickly as possible because like a lot of other people I have bills to pay and not too much help in terms of paying for college. I don't have the time or money to wait years and years before I can even start working towards my degree unfortunately. Anyone have any advice, helpful criticism, or possible alternatives?

Hello, I'm new to the forum, so excuse me if I am posting this in the wrong place. I am currently applying for my Community college's ADN program but I ultimately want to be a CNM. Is it totally crazy for me starting out as an RN with an associates degree first? The reason I'm doing this is because I am going to be supporting myself through school and I figured it would be better for me to work in the field to help me get through it then to be making nothing working in retail. Am I crazy for thinking that I can work part time as a nurse while in working towards my CNM? I figured that after I became an RN I can do an RN to Masters program at my state college. Any advice to an ultimate beginner would be greatly appreciated