Go for the extra education, more education is never a loss.
No problems here. My facility just took away the special pay they were giving nurses for extra shifts worked. This pay was much more than time and a half, it was supposed to last six to eight months and ended up lasting over six years. Many people took advantage of this and would work two or three extra shifts a week. The problem is that they were relying on that money for mortgages, car payments, putting in swimming pools and now it's gone. Those people were living outside their means and admit that bought bigger houses, ect because of that extra pay. Those people are suffering but that's their problem because they were counting on something that was never guaranteed to last. I never did any extra shifts because I didn't want to fall into that trap. They are blaming the economy (which is partially correct) for their poor money management. Some are threatening not to work any overtime since the pay will be normal time and a half after the first four hours of the shift.
My unit also got a NM that has managed to staff appropriately. There aren't tons of open shifts like there used to be, we no longer use 3+ float pool nurses every shift, every day. People are complaining that we are now overstaffed because there was a low census a couple months back for a few days so people were docked. I was docked once and sent home early once (all my patients were downgraded to med/surg status and no ICCU admits), now the hospital is filled to the brim and were practically shoving people out the door to make room.
