hoplite07

Look in more rural areas in the south/midsouth. They have significantly fewer nurses there and often struggle to staff their ICUs.

Both sound like good opportunities. I honestly wouldn't sweat the decision if I was in your shoes. You already have decent experience right now. More will just be icing on the cake. Congrats on the rosy financial picture too, that's awesome!

One class won't sink you in the LONG run. You have lots and lots of classes to take between now and CRNA school. As long as you perform well elsewhere that one potential C could be easily outweighed by good grades elsewhere. That being said, if I was in your shoes I would want to retake the class for several reasons: 1) That grade may hurt you big time on getting into nursing school. You don't have a huge academic history. That'll look bad and nursing schools are pretty competitive. 2) I'd want to prove to myself that the problem was the professor and not me - that I could learn the content. 3) The information you learn in that class is helpful to know. If you already know it, then retaking it should be easy. If you don't, then retaking it should be helpful. 4) An A vs a C will certain help your GPA for CRNA school and leave you more room for "error" down the road.

EmTrauma is planning on applying for next fall. At that point he/she will have about 2.5 years ICU experience. Sure more is great, but that fulfills requirements. For all we know EmTrauma has excellent grades and can handle tough science courses. I agree that experience is important but the question isn't really "should I pursue CRNA now or not?" It's "what drew you to be a CRNA and do you love it?"

Note that Accelerated BSN courses can be very, very competitive. In your case you might want to investigate if an LPN or community college ADN/RN program close to you typically accepts people with lower GPA's. If it does, that might be a quicker route to raising your GPA and getting in.

Mid-thirties with two kids checking in. As everyone else has pointed out there are lots of us out there. If you are interested in finding out if nursing is for you and if you can handle the coursework then just sign up for a prereq class or two at your local community college. The cost will be very low and you'll discover a bit more about what you like.

Lots of concerns, but sounds like this is something you are passionate about. I think your biggest real obstacle is your math skills. However, I wouldn't worry here. I'd just study. If you can teach yourself Algebra then you can certainly teach yourself to handle fractions and percents! Note that these are two very similar areas - so once you get one down then you will probably get the other too!

I'm going to go against the grain and say "no" - don't bother with biology based on the fact that you say you find bio stuff fascinating and "often read medical articles" (this makes me think you have a pretty good idea of science and basics about the human body) with the following caveats: 1) You have found you can easily get good grades in college classes or classes similar to college if you apply yourself. 2) You recognize that you will be "behind" in what you understand and will have a bunch of unfamiliar terminology you'll need to wrap your mind around. Thus, you have to be willing at the front end to really devote a lot of extra reading time and maybe professor visits during office hours to help you understand stuff you don't get at first glance. Personal anecdote from a similar situation: My first semester of college I was registered for Molecular Cell Bio and word on campus was this prof was super hard. This scared me to death because I had no idea how I would perform at a college level and my biology experience in high school was from very poor teachers - thus I didn't understand much at all. Anyways, I hung in there, studied like crazy, and visited my professor 4 or 5 times during the semester to try to clarify stuff I wasn't getting. In the end, I aced the class, needing only something like a 64 on my final to keep an A. A&P material is self-contained. It makes it easier to have a strong bio background but it is by no means necessary. Just my two cents worth.

" your could have a real fulfilling career in nursing but its not going to happen overnight" while this might be true, with an undergrad degree, he might be able to knock out prereqs and take an accelerated bsn course in 12-24 months depending on availability and free time. no need to get an adn unless that route works better for him. if he was like me and was a pre-med major for a while in his undergrad work, then he might have most of his prereqs done already. he could start a 12 mo. accelerated bsn next summer and graduate the following summer. edit: haven't commented much here yet. meant this as a reply to a comment further up the thread. further down, i see he clarifies things. best of luck!