RunnerRN2015

I guess my boys are lucky in that we paid for their college educations. I'm 50 and went to nursing school a couple of years ago. At one point all 3 of us were in college at the same time. We managed to pay cash for their schooling. Thanks to loan forgiveness, I only owe $3000 for mine.

The hospital system has 2 schools associated with it; both schools offer loan forgiveness. They have multiple hospitals and doctors offices; most, if not all, graduates are hired before graduation or very so after.

My school is part of a hospital system and offers a loan forgiveness program if you work for them after graduation. I graduated in Dec 2014. I'll have $10,000 forgiven in another couple of months and have about $3000 left on student loans. I paid about $3000 in cash as well.

I think those 2 classes were the most challenging intermediates. I ended up with a 91.2% in one and a 90.8% in the other -- which would have been fine on a 10 point scale but on an 8 point scale, those scores equalled Bs. I was devastated! I did all of the questions from the Med-Surg Success books (I used those books for every class) as well as the online resources for the textbook. I read every answer and every rationale so I knew why it was right AND why it was wrong. I think doing dozens of questions before every test really helped.

My hospital hires at least 10-12 new grads for the OR twice a year. They get put through Peri Op 101 and have a very extensive orientation. I'm surprised you can't find hospitals that hire new grads.

Unless they've changed, all classes are during the day. The semesters are regular 16 week semesters. All of us in pre-nursing who earned our spot in the nursing program had to sit out that semester. I don't know of any way around that. Sorry!

Congratulations! As far as getting hired after graduation, if you want to work within the CHS system, you won't have a problem getting hired. Most of us had jobs lined up (including hard to get into departments like ED, STICU, MICU, NICU, L & D, peds, etc) a couple of months before graduation. No, you can't skip that 3rd semester, unfortunately, even if you already have all the other classes done. I already had my CNA so I took micro and got it out of the way. If you don't have any other needed classes, you basically have to sit out that semester. It has to do with the timing of the schedule for admissions, etc.

In my 2 previous units, we did have some weekenders who only worked weekends. That being said, we had weekend requirements, depending on whether you worked days or nights. One unit required 6 weekend shifts every 6 weeks for night shifters - you could work Fri/Sat/Sun nights 2 times in a 6 week period, you could work every Fri or Sat or Sun night, or any combo of weekend nights as long as you worked 6 weekend shifts every 6 weeks. For another unit, you had to work at least 2 Mondays (days or nights) and 3 weekend shifts (days were Sat or Sun, nights were Fri or Sat or Sun).

At my school, they did random ones all the time. You could be called out of class or out of clinical for it. It was purely luck of the draw who got called in. You only had a couple of hours to report to Employee Health to do it.

I graduated in Dec 2014. We started the interview process with HR (my school is affiliated with a large healthcare system) early on in our last semester. A large majority of my class had jobs lined up by early-mid November. I passed NCLEX in Jan 2015 and started on my unit the next month.

In school, out of 65 people in my class, there were 8-10 guys. Only 1 was gay...but we also had 2 lesbians, so not sure how that fits into your equation. Do they cancel each other out? On my old unit, there were at least 15-18 male RNs -- and only 1 or 2 are gay. On the flip side there were a couple of lesbians there as well.

My ADN program was 2 years, start to finish -- no pre-reqs needed other than high school requirements. I had a couple of "fresh-out-of-high-school" classmates who graduated high school in June 2012, took a couple of classes in the fall of 2012, started the program with me in Jan 2013, and graduated Dec 2014. Very doable!

Patient representative (registering patients in the ED, taking their insurance information, etc), dietary aide, patient transport, unit secretary, environmental services.

I graduated from CCHS in 2014 so my experiences are still fairly current. Yes, the acceptance rate is low. That's because they get hundreds and hundreds of applications but only start 60-70 students in NUR 101 twice a year, and that's including those who earned guaranteed admission by doing their pre-nursing program. (I did their pre-nursing program, earned a 4.0 and guaranteed admission to the nursing program.) There may only be 30 spots open for direct nursing admission if there is a large number of pre-nursing students who earned a spot. There's a reason why it's difficult to gain admission -- the school is small, the program is extremely rigorous, and graduates are highly sought after, even before they graduate. It's affiliated with Carolinas HealthCare System, which is a HUGE bonus. We get the best clinical hours and the best clinical sites. Class size is small, clinical groups are no more than 8 per instructor, and every single faculty and staff member are there to make sure you succeed. When it comes time to find a job, we have our own HR rep and our students are always placed before any other school, including the BSN programs in the area. PM me or post here if you have more questions!

Our L&D nurses ARE the OR nurses! If a patient needs a c-section, their L&D nurse goes to the OR with them, along with a surg tech. There'e never a time when the OR sends nurses to help with c-sections.

Y'all is a proper pronoun here in the south. :)

Until you have a firm job offer somewhere else, an RN job there is better than no RN job. The only way she can make you commit to 2+ years is if you sign a contract that states you "owe" them a certain amount of time. Don't sign anything. LOL

Sounds like she's interested in interviewing you for a position. It never hurts to go on an interview so I'd call her back and tell her you'd be interested in interviewing for a position. You can get a tour of the facility and ask more about the position and see if it's something you'd like.

We never turned anybody away but they may wait 6-8 hours to be seen unless they had a true emergency.

Not necessarily true. At my school, you CAN complete the entire program in 2 years, no pre-reqs required. It's not easy and most people choose not to do it that way (and most have previous college classes that transfer), but it's possible.

We used ATI throughout school. It's a great program!

Sorry you didn't pass. As an FYI, not everybody needs to study for NCLEX. I didn't and I passed in 75 questions a couple of weeks after graduation. I did 75-100 practice questions a day for about a week and a half but that was it.

I graduated from Carolinas College of Health Sciences with my ADN in 2014. CHS always hires our grads! In fact, with the most recent class, ALL grads were hired by CHS! When HR ranks new grads, CCHS is at the top of the list. I've also worked at Novant and the majority of my co-workers were also ADN RNs. At CHS, while most classmates were hired into their New Grad program and nurse residencies, some were hired directly by their units. Choosing the right school makes a difference!

I'm a former teacher who is now an RN. I've been on nights since I graduated (2014) and hate it. The whole "working nights, working weekends, and working holidays" is NOT for me after 20+ years of teaching. I stumbled across a job posting at the children's hospital where I used to be a CNA and found a job that sounded too good to be true: 5a-2p, 4 days a week (Mon-Fri), no nights, weekends are on call (only 5 weekends a year), holidays are on call rotating (usually every 3 years you'll end up with a big holiday like Christmas). The downside is it's a HUGE pay cut. The hourly rate is about $2.00 less an hour. I won't get any shift diff for nights or weekends (which is A LOT). Very few opportunities to pick up extra shifts. Benefits are worse than my current employee. HOWEVER, knowing that I'll be home in my own bed every night and have every weekend (minus the 5 on calls) free? PRICELESS. I said YES as fast as I could! Only 3 nights shifts to go!

I scored a 99% on the predictor test and passed NCLEX with 75 questions. Good luck!