OakRN2B

I would say it would be VERY helpful to have both a strong community and hospital-related volunteer experience. I don't know where you folks are located but if you're in the East Bay, I know Highland Hospital has an ER volunteer program. He also should make an appointment with one of the counselors in the Admissions Department to help out also. They're very supportive and honest.

Go to www.bart.gov for info on BART, including arrival and departure times and costs, and general information on how Bart works and where it goes. South San Francisco and Daly City are between San Fran and San Mateo.

Your price range sounds about right. You could try South San Francisco or Daly City, they mite be cheaper than San Mateo. I would not recommend commuting from Sacramento - it will take hours each way due to traffic and finding time to read and study would be compromised. The peninsula (south of San Francisco) is more expensive than the East Bay, (Oakland, Berkeley, etc) but you'd still have to commute to San Mateo and get across the Bay, which is not pleasant either way, depending on time of day.

Lil Nurse - which campus are you going to?

iLnurse - Try Craigs List for apartments.

Managing Care of Adults is MedSurg for the most part. Don't worry about it! We'll get what we need.

Mal - I'd wait until you get your Financial Aid Award Letter, so you know how much you want to borrow. You can call ----- in Fin Aid, she's very sweet and helpful for further info.

Thanks White Scrubs, I thought that mite be what ATI is for.

What is the ATI Testing all about? Does anyone know?

Hey Mal, the Wells Fargo Loan you would be eligible for is the MedCap Alternative Loan for Health Professionals: https://www.wellsfargo.com/student/loans/professional/medschoolloan The most you can borrow from this loan for Nursing is $75K. It only takes about 2 days for them to tell you if you qualify. You can apply online. They email you updates and you can check the loan status online. This is the loan I applied for; I have noone that can cosign for me, but I got approved on my own: my credit is good, not very good or great, but good. I think what helped me was the fact that I have a 20 year credit history. They did not ask me for Tax Returns or Pay Stubs. I would recommend giving this a try first. If you can find someone who will cosign, you will want to find someone with good to excellent credit history; having a cosigner with bad credit won't help at all. Also having a cosigner with good credit history could get you a lower interest rate - keep in mind the loan term is 15 years so the interest adds up to a signficiant amount of money. Good luck; hope this helps.

Congrats Mal!!!!!!

I got a Wells Fargo Med Cap Loan also. There's information on the Financial Aid Award Letter about where to look for applying for the Private Loan. Sallie Mae is not listed on there, but SMU does work with Sallie Mae. If you don't have a long credit history and/or bad credit you might need a cosigner. So I would STRONGLY recommend you check out your credit reports. I believe Wells Fargo uses Equifax. Trust me on this last point - the best place to get an accurate credit report and credit score info is from myfico.com.

Thanks Bubbles -that makes me feel better at this point - I knew the Fin Aid part would be stressful, but I'm maxing out on the stress!

Does anyone know....can you take out MORE than 1 Private loan? For example, everyone seems set on the Wells Fargo MedCap Alternative Loan, but I'm also hearing that Wells Fargo is pretty strict when it comes to your credit report, and many people seem to require cosigners....some of us don't have easy access to a cosigner (being a cosigner not only means you're taking responsiblity for the loan payments, but it's also going to ding the cosigner's credit score as well). I would think one could take out as many private loans as needed, but does anyone know for sure? (for example, let's say Wells Fargo approves you for $30,000 and Sallie Mae for $40,000).

JI just applied for my private loan, I"m just curious how other folks are faring with that process?