ackirom

Well I know of at least 3 classes that requires it. But one of those, the Leadership and Management class, I took prior to getting a job. I asked my professor and she allowed me to take it by shadowing someone else instead of a nurse manager. It all depends on ur professor. But I think for the nursing elective as well as the final Capstone class, u hav to have one. So in the meantime, u can take courses that don't require it :)

I graduated in June '10 and got my NCLEX results in July '10. I only got a job half-way in the RN-BSN program so I think UTA only verifies your licensure.

I started the program in Nov '10 and I gotta say, the actual nursing program is great. Workload is reasonable. I should be graduating this Dec '11, but unfortunately, I wasn't careful in looking up the schedules and such, so now I'll be graduating in May '12 =\ In my ADN program, we were assigned to classes (signed us up automatically) and we only had to attend. I forgot that this was a university, and you're responsible for signing up for yourself. Also, I had not completed the English pre-requisite and there is a hell of a lot of general courses required so that really added more workload. For instance, I'm in California, and all the political science courses I took here were invalid because the State of Texas requires college graduates from their state universities to complete Texas political science courses *shrugs* My advice: 1) If you know what general courses you have to take, plan to take them in a community college, online if possible, cuz it is a lot easier there and they will be credited. If you decide to take them at UTA, which is what I did, just remember that it is an actual university and those course will have to be completed according to their standards. 2) Make sure to print a calendar and mark the start dates of all the nursing classes that you need to take. I learned this lesson the hard way. Some nursing courses are only given twice a year and if you miss your window, well... then you're gonna have to graduate late, like me =( 3) If you've signed up for a course, make sure you see it thru!!! Tuition fees are non-refundable after DAY 2! Gawd. I took a nursing course and had to drop, on the 4th day due to personal issues, and couldn't get a refund (a few hundred dollars gone to waste, b00!). But that was my fault for not knowing the policy. But now you know! 4) Complete your work a few hours ahead of the deadline as there are glitches in the online system sometimes. UTA is in Arlington, TX, so all the course deadlines are in Central Standard Time. It just sucks if you're behind cuz then you feel cheated, like I'm in Pacific time, so if the deadline is 11:59pm CST, it's really 9:59pm in my time. All in all, it's a good program. I didn't really have problems with the online setting, in fact I preferred it. Nursing courses are in EPIC and general courses are mostly in Blackboard. Look at your courses a month ahead and buy those books ahead of time cuz you don't want to have to pay expedited s/h. Besides, most courses are only 5 wks long. Some nursing courses have required textbooks but you don't really need them. I barely opened my book for the Leadership and Management course and you can use any care plan book for that Health Assessment class, but you will need the other required book. Someone asked about having to complete all 3 pre-requisite before you start, and well, I had already taken intro to nurs, pharm and patho in my ADN so I didn't have to do it at UTA. I applied in this program because I wanted to be done in 13 months plus it was the cheapest. Because it's taken me almost 2 years instead of 13 months, I'm not so satisfied with it. They need to offer nursing courses year round, not just sometimes. I'm not all that happy with that part of it, plus all the general courses, so I'm just glad I'm almost done with this. Good luck to you guys in your BSN quest! Do your research!!!

Hi, all! I'm a new student nurse on the med-surg unit, and my teacher always asked me, why is your patient here? I'd always say the chief of complaint. One of my patients hadn't had a BM in 3 days, hx of stroke, pressure ulcers and all, and I told my teacher that but then she goes, "so, why not just give him a stool softener? an enema? why keep him here? I just couldn't answer her. So my question is, after being admitted to the ER, what is the reason patients are kept on the med-surg floor? What part of their chart is going to tell me that? Is it the labs? I don't know where to look :imbar Thanks!